


In a new Light

by Bebec



Series: Some divine, hellish stuff [2]
Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst and Feels, Angst and Humor, Bombs, Break Up, Deal with a Devil, F/M, Free Will, Friendship/Love, Hurt Chloe Decker, Hurt Lucifer Morningstar (Lucifer TV), Hurt No Comfort, Investigations, Miracles, Past Lives, Protective Lucifer Morningstar (Lucifer TV), Revelations, Sad Ending, Season/Series 03, Sequel, Surprise Ending, The Fall - Freeform, Trapped In Elevator, Trust, Truth, What the Devil didn't tell you, Work In Progress, sinnerman
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-16
Updated: 2019-02-27
Packaged: 2019-04-01 04:11:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13990221
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bebec/pseuds/Bebec
Summary: Sequel “ What the Devil needs “ – An elevator, our two partners who go into it… Fluffy stuff, you say? Not really. It’ll be hot, though… In a way.





	1. Prolog

**Author's Note:**

> Author’s notes:  
> \------------  
> I promised a sequel, there is the sequel ^^  
> There have so many things to talk about! Like his vulnerability and her miracle-stuff. There will be several chapters, not a lot. This first prolog is very short but it was essential; you’ll quickly understand why.  
> Happy reading!

**PROLOG**

****

**_Ten…_ **

He rushes to the doors and grazes his hands on the metal.

This isn’t possible.

**_Nine…_ **

A tremor and he tumbles on his back.

He hears her screaming and tumble too.

**_Eight…_ **

He uses his hands to stand up while another tremor shakes the elevator filled with stifling smoke that only partially hides this short countdown.

He coughs, he suffocates. Then he reaches out for her.

**_Seven…_ **

He can feel her fingers touching his but another tremor pulls them away from each other.

Fear overwhelms him.

There’s not much time left.

**_Six…_ **

He can’t get her out of here in time.

Sparks dance before his eyes reddened by the smoke around him.

He can’t stay here and do nothing; he can’t let her die.

**_Five…_ **

_“ Detective ! “_

He coughs again and looks for her.

Another tremor and the elevator falls from a few meters. He hears her scream in front of him, frightened. Her scream mingles with the grinding noise made by the metal against the concrete of the building. His hands are tensed on the walls. He tries to fight the panic overwhelming him, too.

They’re falling.

**_Four…_ **

The fall stops abruptly, a terrible snap resounding outside as the whole elevator shakes with this frail balance above the void.

He lets out an exclamation of relief, however quickly caught up with panic.

**_Three…_ **

_“ Lucifer ! “_

He sees her crouching in the opposite corner, moving her trembling hand towards him.

He leans over, he tries to reach her.

Her hand…

**_Two…_ **

Their fingers touch each other, they are brushing against each other.

Their eyes meet, sharing the same panic.

**_One…_ **

“ **_Chloe !_** “

A scream. Quickly followed by hers.

“ **_Lucifer !_** “

A new explosion above them break their eye contact and keeps their hands apart from each other.

They fall one last time.

 

**TBC**


	2. Later

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s notes:  
> _________________  
> Hey !  
> I was hanging around on my AO3 profile this afternoon when I saw something that made me laugh. I had 666 hits on this sequel. No more, no less. If this number is not a sign from our lovely Lucifer! XD  
> So… thanks to this, I’ve decided to publish one week earlier the second chapter.  
> Happy devilish reading !

**LATER**

_[Two hours earlier]_

Lucifer hid his umpteenth yawn behind his palm and rubbed his eyes, exhausted by the detective’s overrunning vigor on this new case.

Did she never have fun?

Did she only know what this word could mean?

He was rather skeptical about it.

He put the boring file that he was unsuccessfully trying to read for five minutes now on his partner’s desk and rested his back against his uncomfortable seat. What wouldn’t he give for a scotch… Lucifer sighed and turned his seat to the big glass board covered with pictures and various papers useful to the investigation. Chloe was turning her back to him, her tense posture still showing the intense reflection in which she was entangled.

“ Are you trying to melt this board with your insightful mind, Detective? “, he teased her, leaning on the desk.

“ No, I’m trying to find our suspect… Wanna give a shot? “, replied the young woman immediately without turning, her finger touching each paper.

“ With pleasure! Let’s go think about this with a drink at Lux! “

He pretended to stand up and walk towards the mean stairs of the precinct.

“ Go ahead. “, said the detective absent-mindedly, who hadn’t move an inch. “ I’m staying here. “

Lucifer sighed deeply again while rolling his eyes, annoyed by her tireless obstinacy. Even Mazikeen was taking a slight break from the time she tortured damned souls in Hell. He turned back and joined Chloe in this useless cogitation.

“  You can do that? “, she suddenly asked.

“ Excuse me? “

“ Melting things with your eyes? “

“ I’m the devil, Detective; not a bloody _X-men_ ! “, replied her partner.

She shrugged, apparently thinking that this possibility was not that absurd that he was saying.

“ Just asking.“, she said, looking at the glass board again. “ And, you know… the devil is supposed to control fire, so… “

“ _Uhg_ … Bloody Hell! “, exclaimed Lucifer, sighing again. “ I’m a fallen angel; not a match or a laser beam! What kind of books are you reading lately? “

“ Every kind. The Holy Bible isn’t really useful for my research, though. “

“ Can’t say I’m surprised. The Bible isn’t really useful except for praising the **A** lmighty **D** ouche, Detective. “, assured her partner, putting his hands in his pockets. “ You really thought finding some truth in this old book? That could be a modern version of _faith_ … “

The young woman merely nodded as an answer, still stubbornly looking the glass board before them.

“ I don’t think it’s so far from the truth as you say. It describes you like a lustful imp having a deep taste for all sorts of perversion, for instance. ‘Sounds like the truth for me, doesn’t it? “

Chloe smiled at him when he didn’t, annoyed.

“ I can’t deny my good taste for funny activities. “, he granted. “ But why even read this _so-called divine_ nonsense when you have a priceless source of information right here? “

He was the priceless source, of course.

Who better than he could correctly answer in details to his partner’s questions? A question about the devil needed an answer from the devil himself, didn’t it?

“ What if this _great_ source of information always eludes one question of mine? “, said then the detective.

“ What? I do-… “

He kept quiet.

It would have been complicated for Lucifer to pretend not to understand this clever hint. He was far from being stupid. Just like Chloe. She knew him, recently accepted as the actual devil or not. And Lucifer Morningstar wasn’t that difficult to understand. Immortal being or not, he was acting just like any other human being who had to face an unpleasant situation he would rather not to; although this simplistic parallel didn’t please him.  

He didn’t look like anyone else.

He was Lucifer.

Yet, he was as simple as a human could be by constantly eluding this talk. A part of it, at least. A tiny part put aside that night because he asked her. And because she was agreed to do so.

_“ Not tonight. “_

A week had passed. And then another. A long peaceful time not to worry about this tiny part put on hold until a later date. It hadn’t been easy at first, of course. Lucifer could hardly bitch about that to the detective who had had her own way to deal with these big changes in her life; she who had accepted him so easily that night. He could understand her odd behavior in Charlotte’s presence as soon as she walked into the room. He could understand her need to talk with Mazikeen and thus reassure her mother’s fears; although the description of the demon about her former job in Hell didn’t really help at the time.  

And he could understand her need for answers about anything and everything since. Just as Chloe could understand his own behavior about this talk. She had given him time, as much as he had left her to accept this big news.

_“ This explanation will be for another time, if you don’t mind. If there is another time, of course. “_

****

For _another time_.

Here it was. She had waited long enough and he had eluded long enough.

This new case and this vile bomber wouldn’t be enough to distract her from this urgent need to know. Once the detective started searching for answers, nothing in the world could stop her.

Not even the devil himself.

“ Detective, I don’t know what yo-… “, he tried anyway, simply unable to open this closed door.

“ Lucifer, I get it. “, she interrupted him, not angry at all. “ I know there’s something you don’t want to tell me because you fear I react badly or that I run away from you, but… After everything you’ve told me about the demons, angels, God… I think I wouldn’t be here right now talking to you if I couldn’t handle it. So… Whatever you have to tell me, I’m sure I can hear it. You can trust me, okay? “

Trust…

_“ I trust you. “_

But would she still trust him after that?

They both looked at each other, one eager for answers as the other was eager for a way-out.

“ Detective, I-I’m…uhm… “, Lucifer stammered awkwardly.

“ Hey! Guess _who_ had big news about our dear bomb victim Martha Jameso-…? “, Ella exclaimed joyfully as she arrived behind them. 

Lucifer and Chloe quickly moved away from each other, only realizing now that they were barely a few inches between them until Ella’s loud arrival. The forensic stared at them and smiled.

“ _Whoops!_ Sorry guys! I can go if you’re busy with something b-…

“ Nope. Lucifer and I were just talking about…uh…about his family, _right_? “, the detective said, glancing at him.

“ Sort of, yes. “

Ella nodded, seemingly pleased to know what they were talking about.

“ Ah, _family_! We love and hate them all the same, huh? It’s so difficult to live in a big family, you know? I don’t even remember all my brothers and sisters names! Totally unbelievable! But, you know…not that easy to remember six names! “, talked all alone the young woman. “ What about you, _big Luci-guy_ ? How many siblings? “

“ Well, without Uriel… seventy-one. “

The two women stared at him, speechless, while Lucifer didn’t understand their reaction. She asked him and he gave her the answer, that’s all. There was nothing to be so surprised, especially for so little.

Before the forensic could top about her partner’s words, Chloe took action.

“ You said having news, Ella? “

“ _Ow_ , right! “

She finally opened the file and took a particular paper from it, giving it to the detective.

“ The lab send us the results for this strange material found in what was left of the bomb on the crime scene and this is not _sugar_ that killed our poor Martha! “

Lucifer approached his partner and read with her the results from the lab.

“ _Turpentine_ ? “, they both read aloud.

Chloe lifted her head, frowning in intense reflection.

“ Why add turpentine to a homemade bomb? What’s the point? Half of the living room had gone up in smoke. “

“ Exactly! “, said Ella. “ The bomb alone was enough to kill our girl, _but_ it could never had done all this mess in her house. Way too small! “

“ Then wha-? “, asked the detective. “Wait a second. The oil of turpentine… “

Ella nodded quickly, being all excited to enlighten Chloe and Lucifer about this.

“ Oil of turpentine is highly flammable and so toxic; it could have leveled up our bomb here. You know, like _boum_ mixed with _fschouuuuuush_ ! “

“ Right… “, said Lucifer, staring at the forensic.

“ Could explain the living room burned to a cinder and the lack of evidence. “, deduced Chloe, turning to the glass board again. “ Our suspect wanted to wipe away any details that could have lead us to him. He might not think of turpentine and-…Or maybe… “

“ Maybe what? “, Lucifer asked her.

“ I don’t know. How someone so careful about details could have missed this? He should have known that the fire wouldn’t totally burn turpentine, right? Unless-… “

“ Unless our dear bomber wanted us to find it? “, helped Lucifer.

“ Yeah, like a signature maybe. “, murmured the detective, looking at him, pensive.  

She pinched her lips and turned to Ella who was still near her desk.

“ What kind of turpentine is this? “

The forensic quickly flipped through the file in search of this data.

“ It seems coming from some Canadian tree; _balsam tree._ “, she told them, reading another paper in the file.

Lucifer turned to the detective.

“ Our victim had a half-brother, hadn’t she? He said running a store specialized into Canadian stuffs, I think. Sounds guilty enough for me, Detective! What do you say? “

“ Yeah. He studied chemistry at university; that’s quite useful to make a bomb. I think he said he was working the entire morning when that happened. We should go talk to him again. Thanks, Ella! “

“ No problem! “, said the young woman before leaving them, smiling again.

Chloe quickly put the files aside on her desk while searching for the half-brother’s address. She put on her black jacket and moved her hair from the collar, then looking at her partner.

“ We’ll talk about all this later, okay? “

Without waiting for an answer, she went to the main staircase of the precinct. Lucifer let out a slight sigh as he fixed his gaze on his partner’s silhouette, not so hurry to join her and thus short this tiny break she was giving him again. 

“ Later… “, he murmured at last as he walked away from Chloe’s desk, worried that he would have face this _later_ much sooner than he would have liked.

Hopefully, this _boom-hunt_ would be much longer than expected.

He could still pray in this way, but – as everybody knew – that wasn’t him at all.

 

**TBC**

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s notes:  
> ________________  
> I’m not an expert at all in turpentine, of course. I just did some research here and there, that’s all. Sorry then if this explanation sounds totally unrealistic. ^^’  
> I’ve already written the third chapter in French, but I won’t begin to translate it now. I want to finish to write the entire story in French first.  
> Sorry TT  
> I hope you’ll like this new chapter, anyway and I thank you for the many comments, hits (666 ^^) and bookmarks on it!  
> See you soon! :3


	3. Why do we fall?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's notes:  
> _______________  
> I know, it's been a while.   
> For my defense, I was writing ! I was, really ! In french, but-... Okay, okay! I'm gonna translate a lot to seek your forgiveness. ^^  
> As Navaros asked me, here is the third chapter. This isn't beta-checked at all so... sorry, but a lot of mistakes, for sure.   
> Let's hope you'll like it anyway.

**WHY DO WE FALL?**

Chloe was clearly not used to the quiet silence around her.

Not a total silence, of course; horn blasts from other vehicles frequently resounded through the half-opened window, just like this very specific buzzing of life in every big city. There was a lot of noises and sounds outside, but none that really interested her. Her partner’s deep voice was the sound she would have liked to hear now; his remarks about her private life, her wrong interpretation about the divine – not the divine she thought, it seemed – or even his annoying and yet oddly essential bawdy hints.

She tapped the wheel with her fingers while waiting for the traffic light to turn green and looked briefly at Lucifer’s stubbornly quiet profile sitting beside her. The way he had put his right arm on the ledge of the open window with his hand that partially hid his mouth could seem trivial for anyone else, but not for the detective. He was watching the people walking on the streets, completely unaware of being watched too. Chloe knew him too well now to see only a common silence between them both just because they didn’t know what to talk about or exhaustion. Something was bothering him.

And she might know what this was all about.

She kept looking at him, also pensive. Chloe felt a little bad to be the main reason of his anxiety. She wanted so much to know everything she had missed so far that she sometimes forgot to take Lucifer’s feelings into consideration. They might both had gotten things straight when she had inadvertently found his wings in his closet, she was still having difficulty to get used to the idea that the world wasn’t as _rational_ as she had thought.

Her partner was the Devil.

Amenadiel was an angel and Mazikeen a demon who had been created to torture human souls in Hell for all eternity.

Charlotte Richards had come back from the dead after that her body had momentarily been possessed by the Goddess of All Creation.

This goddess who was Lucifer’s mother; his brother’s and all the other angels.

As for their father… It was almighty God.

God existed for real and-

And Chloe was standing in the middle of this; mortal and insignificant.

Fortunately, talking about this with Linda had helped her a lot. Two insignificant mortal beings could understand each other in this supernatural situation, after all. The therapist had been very attentive to her fears or questions about life when Lucifer had been himself unable to deal with her existential crisis. And the detective didn’t want him to see her like this and thus begin to doubt about their relationship. She didn’t want him to understand this in the wrong way, as he often did.

She wasn’t and would never be afraid of _him_.

In the middle of her unpredictable existence, it was something she would ever think otherwise.

She was just questioning everything.

Like… absolutely _everything!_

Dozens and dozens of questions had been constantly coming through her mind for weeks. Questions as relevant as terribly stupid and embarrassing to ask aloud.

Have the angels ever been kids before? Like human children; playing and doing stupid things while the parents didn’t look around?

How was Lucifer when he was a kid? Did he have little wings? Like the wings of a dragonfly?

How far could she control her life if God was indeed omniscient and therefore had a total control on everyone and everything on Earth?

Did she have the right – as a simple human being – to kill other people for saving lives or hers? Did she have the right to send them to Hell earlier than it was planned?

Would she end up in Hell?

And what about Daniel? Trixie?

Where was her dad? Was he in Hell or Heaven?

And what about _Hitler?!_

She had so many questions in mind and couldn’t ask them all to Lucifer because he couldn’t understand them all. Linda could and had been able to help her with this. She had helped her to redefine reasonable limits about her control on her life and her decisions. As the therapist had knowingly decided to keep talking to her partner, Chloe had knowingly chosen to stay that night.

She could have control on some things.

As for the rest…

There was nothing she could do about it. She had to deal with it.

Yes, Chloe had felt pretty lost for a while. Back then, she hadn’t taken much interest about others. She was questioning Lucifer about his life without thinking about how this change might have affected him. Devil or not, that was a great change in his life. He might have other questions in mind; not about the universe and all that, but about her… about _them_. They were trying to continue as if it didn’t matter and change anything, but it did anyway.

She _knew._

_Knowing_ changed everything.

_Knowing_ opened other doors that Lucifer didn’t seem to agree to unlock for her.

A door in particular.

A subject they avoided for weeks and that Chloe finally felt ready to open. She knew; she wanted to know _more_ now.

Why was he mortal near her? Why did it seem so difficult to explain?

She could still see the tension that had appeared in his whole body and eyes when she asked why. Him asking to no going further that night. Was the truth that terrible? Maybe not. Maybe he was just too anxious about it and gave that bad feeling?

Maybe.

Anyway, Chloe couldn’t force him to tell her the truth when he clearly didn’t seem ready for it.

She just wished he did, that he trusted her.

Still leaning against the window, Lucifer finally looked away from the crowded streets and met the detective’s eyes. He lowered his hand to his chin, rubbing his fingers while staring at her.

“What?”

The traffic lights were green again and she slightly shook her head, focusing on the road.

“Nothing.”, she said, smiling. “It’s just-… unusual to see you that _quiet._ I must remember this moment. For posterity, you know?”

“Very funny, Detective! If I can help future generations, I guess it’s for the best…”

Chloe laughed and, first hesitant, tried again to approach this _locked door_.

“You look worried.”, she said.

Lucifer shrugged, avoiding again to meet her gaze as he looked out the window.

“It’s nothing.”

A clear and short answer that didn’t discourage the young woman.

“Wanna talk about it?”

“There’s nothing to talk about, really. You should look the road, Detective. I’m not sure the LAPD would see a car accident as good publicity.”, he joked.

“Is this all about our talk at the precinct?”, she easily guessed, her assumption immediately confirmed by the tension in her partner’s posture.

He tried again to elude Chloe’s relevant comment;

“Absolutely not, Detective. I--“

“Because there’s nothing to worry about.”, she interrupted him with a reassuring smile. “You can talk to me, okay?”

Lucifer looked at her for a long time, his doubts appearing on his features. He was about to say something when the detective’s cellphone made them both jump with its loud ringing inside the car. Chloe turned on the loudspeaker, disappointed to be stopped so close to her goal, and cleared her throat to be heard over the road noises.

“Decker.”

_“Hey, Clo. You found our guy?”_ , asked Daniel straight away.

“Hi, Dan. He wasn’t difficult to find; this shop means so much to him. That’s what he said.”, she answered, turning left and leaving the crowded streets of Los Angeles behind.

Lucifer didn’t say anything, although he would have before, and absent-mindedly listened to the two detectives sharing their information.

“He has a good alibi.”, the young woman kept talking. “Half of his employees confirmed he was there when the shop opened on Wednesday morning. He even had a minor accident with a customer at the time of his sister’s death; everything’s saved on the security cameras.”

_“So... We’re finding ourselves at square point one again. Too bad.”_

“Not necessarily. He recently fired one of his employees for theft and aggressive conduct towards the customers and the staff. The last two months, every person arguing with him had seen their car explode the next days.”

_“You think t--”_

Chloe slightly nodded.

“I Found this weird that our suspect willingly leaves behind him a huge evidence like turpentine; a very specific one. Maybe he tried to take revenge on his former boss?”, the detective assumed.

_“Could be that, yeah.”_ said her ex-husband. _“What’s his name?”_

“Ian Coleman. Jameson gave us his last address; he’s leaving to the north of L.A. ’Won’t be long to find out if he’s our guy.”

Silence briefly filled the other end of the line until Daniel spoke again;

_“Chloe… You’re not gonna arrest him on your own, are you?”_

“I’m not; my partner’s coming with me.”, she replied, smiling to her partner.

_“Well, that’s a relief! Nothing bad will never happen to you with Lucifer around, obviously…”_

Then, Lucifer stuck his nose in the chat, desiring to defend his valuable place in their partnership, whatever Daniel might think of it.

“I’m so glad you have faith in me, Daniel!”

_“I’m just saying that you should be careful here. This guy is pretty good to make bombs and I don’t want to see you both killed in an explosion, okay? I’m gonna warn Pierce and prepare a team and you, you wait--”_

“He’ll run away if he sees us coming with the entire mine-clearing squad!”, Chloe interrupted him. “We can’t take that risk. Lucifer and I have a chance to stop him before anyone else gets hurt or killed, okay? We’ll be careful.”

She could almost see Daniel hesitate near his desk while another silence followed her last confident words. More or less confident… but this, Daniel didn’t have to know.

_“Fine.But--... Don’t be reckless, Chloe, uh?”_

“I won’t, I promise.”, she reassured him. “I’ll call you later. Bye.”

And she hung up.

“The Detective _Douche_ doesn’t seem as worried for me as he is for you, Detective.”, Lucifer noticed after that, sighing annoyingly. “I should be upset about it, shouldn’t I?”

“I’m sure he is.”

“Lying is a sin.”, he told her with a smile as he closed his window. “He’s right, you know?”

“About what?”

“You’re not the type to rush headlong to apprehend a suspect; it’s mine. Not that I do not approve this sudden change, but still… It’s reckless.”

The young woman looked deeply confused by his speech, staring at him for a long time and then exclaimed in a falsely surprised tone;

“It can’t be, I’m dreaming, for sure… Lucifer, the Devil… who’s careful?!”

Lucifer gave her a disgruntled look, hiding under it his discomfort. He shrugged and looked through the windshield.

“I’m always careful with your life, Detective.”, he said then, not looking at her directly.

Chloe didn’t find anything to reply, really touched by his sincere concern that seemed to change his tenacious habits to “first, hit the bad guy; then, ask questions...eventually”.

It looked like their role were reversed, for once. She, the death-defying partner; and him, the reason itself. There was a risk; that was true, she couldn’t deny it. A bomber, two partners with only one armed with a gun and badge… The ratio of power was certainly not attractive here.

But Lucifer wasn’t like anyone else.

He was the Devil.

This guardian-Devil watching her back for two years, wings or not in the equation. He wasn’t totally invulnerable, from what she understood that night, but she was still convinced that nothing serious would ever happen to them as long as they trusted each other.

And she does.

“What a bomber like Coleman could do against the Devil himself, hm?”, she replied then. “Everything will be fine.”

“I hope so, Detective. I hope so…”

She couldn’t say if he was referring to their suspect or their next talk about hellish-divine stuff.

Probably both.

 

**-xXx-**

 

Chloe and Lucifer entered the building, both on their guards.

Jameson had specified that the place of the suspect wasn’t really well-appointed, neither welcoming; probably like its tenant.

But the detective clearly hadn’t expected this.

Nobody around; nor in the streets nearby or inside this hall. The walls were cracked and covered with some things that Chloe didn’t want to know anything about it. She slightly jumped as she heard a noise near the door and grimaced in disgust when she saw a big rat bolting without further ado.

“Well, well, well! Welcome to the landfill of L.A., Detective!”, Lucifer exclaimed, carefully moving with his shoe a can before him.

“It looks like nobody has lived here for ten years or so…”

“Rather ages, if you ask me. What are these?”, Lucifer asked, leaning over. “Cockroaches… Lovely creatures!”

Chloe approached the mailboxes and passed Lucifer who was watching with interest the cockroaches wiggling on the ground and climbing along the wall. She searched the name of their suspect, looking every mailbox covered with spider web.

“It’s here.”, she said, Lucifer turning to her. “He lives on the top floor.”

“Are you up for an elevator trip, Detective?”, proposed her partner, pointing to the elevator a little further down the hall.

“Is this thing still working?”

Lucifer approached the _thing_ and pushed the button, carefully stepping back after that, which amused her. They waited and then heard the characteristic noise warning the opening of the doors. The elevator looked in pretty good condition. It was so clean inside that it clashed with the rest of the building. Chloe looked the inside of the elevator for a long time, not moving yet. Lucifer didn’t either.

No electric wires coming out from the walls, no strange grating or fluctuating lightnings.

Everything seemed good.

Lucifer shrugged and walked to the elevator, Chloe still hesitant to do so.

The staircase was right there and much safer than this ascent in this deserted building. Safer. And much longer. Coleman might hear them arrive before they even reach the top floor and he would run away.

By using the elevator, they could have a head start on him. Not much, but just enough to hope to catch him.

“Didn’t you want to live on the edge for once? Come here!”, said Lucifer with a grin.

“As long as you well-behave…”, she warned him before coming inside, the doors closing after.

Lucifer pushed the button for the top floor and Chloe looked up the left top corner of the cabin, intrigued to see a security camera there.

Who could have placed it in this elevator without taking care of the rest of the building?

_“That’s strange…”_

“Carnal games in an elevator are certainly enjoyable, but not my favorite, Detective.”, replied Lucifer. “But this is still a wonderful way to take anyone to seventh heaven!”

“I’m sure it is.”

He turned to her and his smile widened on his face, Chloe sensing a lot of inappropriate questions coming right away in his mind.

“Did I hear straight? The amazing Detective Decker - The Hot Tub’s Queen - has never lived the delightful ascent of desire? I cannot believe this!”

“I do--”

A sudden jolt stopped her and she lost her balance, Lucifer catching hold of her arm to prevent her from the fall. The jolt stopped as fast as it had appeared, silence filling the space around.

“What was that?”, the detective asked, looking around, worried.

Lucifer let go of her and approached the control panel, pushing a button a first time, then several times with no significant result.

“The elevator has stopped. Nothing’s working, apparently.”

“Can you open the doors?”, Chloe asked him.

Then another voice rose in the cabin, answering for Lucifer;

**_“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”_ **

Chloe stepped back in the middle of the cabin, looking all around her, Lucifer acting the same.

“Who’s this? Coleman? Is that you?”

**_“You’re a good detective.”_** , he answered to her. **_“I’m surprised you came here without back-up. That’s pretty hazardous.”_**

She looked up and see the camera again, which - unlike earlier - seemed turning on, slightly moving with each of their movements.

“Dealing with an insignificant cockroach is not hazardous, not to me.”, Lucifer replied with a smirk. “Why even use bombs while you could rather use your hands to punish someone? Tiny tips, I guess?”

She knew Lucifer; she knew what he was trying to do here. As long as Ian was talking, they still have time to find a way-out to this. And the Devil seemed naturally gifted to make people talk even in the worst situations.

Like here, by putting in doubt Ian’s virility.

She came closer to Lucifer who was standing in front of the doors and disdainfully staring at the camera.

**_“That’s not the question. Why bother getting my hands dirty? Bombs are much more effective than any other weapon, won’t you agree?”_ **

“So, you do say you killed Mrs. Jameson?”, tried the detective. _“Can you get us out of here?”_ , she whispered to Lucifer, being careful not to move her lips too much.

He barely shook his head, not looking at her.

_“He might have trapped the elevator… Our timing is too short to take that risk, Detective.”_

_“We don’t have other choice, do we?”_

**_“I am not saying anything of that sort, Detective Decker. I’m just talking to you, knowing that nothing of it would never be heard by anyone else.”_ **

“Because you are planning to kill us, of course…”, said Lucifer quietly, Chloe nevertheless feeling the tension inside his body.

**_“Not me, no.”_** , replied Ian. **_“The bombs.”_**

“ _The_ bombs?”, repeated Chloe, frowning.

As an answer happened an explosion outside the cabin, right under their feet; and a terrible jolt made Chloe fall on her knees. She cried of surprise, her eyes wide-opened with fear; smoke was already filling the space and hid Lucifer from her sight. It quickly became stifling, the young women coughing louder and louder, hearing again the bomber’s threatening voice.

**_“What did you say earlier, Mr. Morningstar? The elevator is a wonderful way to take anyone to seventh heaven, is that right? Well, maybe it’s time for you both to come back down to earth.”_ **

“Son of a--”, Lucifer swore from the other side of the cabin, the smoke making his voice hoarse.

**_“The brakes have just exploded and the only thing that’s keeping you alive is the main cable. But it won’t last long, I’m afraid… “_** , falsely complained Ian. **_“Ten seconds, at best.”_**

With these words, Chloe saw the number ten appear on the screen above the closed doors. She immediately understood what was going to happen, horrified. She gave a frightened look at Lucifer who rushed to the doors, crying of rage.

**_“Any final word to say?”_ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's notes:  
> ______________  
> So !   
> How was it ? :)  
> For the next time ;   
> I can translate the next chapter of "From darkness arose the light" or the next one of this story.   
> About "In a New Light", would you prefer one chapter from time to time like I did until now or that I translate everything before posting again ? (like I did for the french version of it)   
> Let me know what you prefer and leave a comment if you want to ! ;)


	4. Seventh basement

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I rushed to finish tonight !   
> Possible mistakes, like a lot since I haven't re-red the whole thing. I'll do this tomorrow. Now, i'm just dead ^^'  
> I truly hope you'll enjoy this new (nor beta-checked; nor re-read) chapter. 
> 
> A lot of angst, a lot of... everything ;)

**SEVENTH BASEMENT**

 

 

Chloe hated the rain.

She hated this steady dampness that was crashing on her skin, that was tirelessly following the curve of her cheek and, finally, that was sinking inside her ear.

She hated this.

She should have known that the weather forecast would be once more far from reality. This was not a “clear blue sky”; not to her.

If she had paid a bit more attention to this kind of detail, Chloe would never have thought to sleep outside with this endless rain that was tormenting her. Not that sleeping outside was really in her habits; that was rather occasional, if not an exception.

But then…

Why would she do this?

Another drop fell on her cheek and rolled higher than her tormented ear for once, teasing the back of her neck. Chloe shivered and slightly turned her head, her other cheek - the right one, spared until then by the rain - meeting a soft fabric beneath.

This was way beyond softness.

What was this?

It was undefinable, though. Softer than any fabric she knew and yet quite _stiff_ beneath her skin. How could it even be both?

The detective slightly moved her cheek, and the strange fabric started a bit against her, the sensation being echoed inside the rest of her body. She guessed then that this fabric was taller than she had thought in the first place. As big as a human body, at least.

Really really odd.

Some _moving_ blanket, perhaps?

A new drop fell on her temple and ran along the slight fold of her shut eyelid. That was just what Chloe needed to realize that it was not water at all.

Whatever it was, it was thicker than simple water.

Frowning, Chloe lifted her hand to her shut eyes to remove this liquid on her right eye. She tried not to think to the stinging pain that was burning inside her limbs, rubbing her face awkwardly for a few seconds before finally opening her eyes.

She first stared a long time at her fingers covered of a thin coat of oil; then she looked further up.

She wasn’t outside, tormenting by rain.

She was far from it.

She looked at the electric wires hanging down the wall, the flickering light in the center of the smashed ceiling, its metal folded into a bumpy curve, supporting something heavy. Too heavy for it. She moved her neck in a way that let her see behind her, looking at the top of the elevator doors that were still closed.

_The elevator._

Her breathing quickened as she started to remember the last events, her breath still trapped with the memory of a chilling fear.

God, they--

Coleman. The bombs and--

They fell.

Struggling to calm down, the detective blinked several times, her vision becoming blurry somehow, and she leaned on her forearm. She moaned when she felt a sharp pain growing inside her left temple and instantly moved her hand to her forehead. This oil was not the only liquid that had invaded her face, it seemed, given the large amount of blood on her palm.

She lowered her hand and was relieved to feel sensations in her whole body, numb and sore by the fall, of course; and yet still following her basic instructions - moving one of her toes, take a deep breath… She was doing well, given the situation.

How was that even possible?

This fall was--

It was…

Chloe jumped as she felt another jolt beneath her palm when she tried to straighten up a little. She looked down.

Feathers. A white wing as tall as she was.

_“What the h--?”_

Rudely whipping the blood that was still running along her chin with the back of her hand, the young woman followed with her gaze the end of it, stuck beneath her, to its source. She turned a little bit to her right and let out an horrified exclamation. The source was not far from her - not inside this narrow cabin - and was still on the ground. It was not its stillness that upset Chloe, but rather the state of this unknown source. The wing stuck beneath her butt was pretty getting off lightly - only enduring her weight against its sensitive feathers. The other one, on the other hand, didn’t have that luck - raised like this in Lucifer’s back, into an odd and unnatural angle. The end of it was driven in the metallic wall behind. Her heart beating furiously inside her chest, Chloe followed with her eyes the huge gap along the entire length of the wall and the bloodstains on the ripped open metal; some glowing feathers were still hanging up by metallic splinters.

It was like a cat that would have stuck its claws on some wallpaper, ripping it off until touching the floor.

This stupid parallel was the only thing that came to the young woman’s mind who was still in shock.

She looked at the wounded wing again, a shiver running all along her spine. A lot of blood was still flowing from its gashed end, falling on the floor right behind Lucifer and along the few unarmed feathers.

She gagged, her throat still hurting from her previous screams of fear. Chloe put her hand to her mouth, closing her eyes to try to calm down. Shaking from head to toe - both from disgust and shock - she took a deep breath and opened her eyes, instantly seeing her partner’s huddled body.

“Lucifer…”

He didn’t react, just his left wing beneath her that was jolting from time to time, like an instinctive move not depending on its owner’s consciousness.

Chloe began to lean against the metallic wall and brutally pulled her hand away from it with a cry of pain. That was boiling hot.

Ho-?

The bombs. The explosion.

The deadly heat it had released was now spread through the elevator structure. She rubbed her palm reddened with blood and this unexpected burn, getting to her feet a second time. She had to be more careful. God only knew - and that wasn’t just an expression - how the cabin was still intact. She leaned on the coldest parts, startling with the slightest snap above their heads or the rain of dust stinging her eyes. However, she didn’t have to walk a lot to reach Lucifer, his face resting from a few inches to the doors wrapped by the burning heat outside.

She put her fingers against his neck, looking for a pulse. He hadn’t moved since she awoke in this terrible chaos around, still and nevertheless tense - unable to escape pain; whether he’s unconscious or not. He flinched when she touched him, frowning but not opening his eyes. Nor even moving a little bit.

He was alive; that was great and enough for her.

“Lucifer? Can you hear me?” tried the detective, shifting her hand to his cheek.

As only answer, he uttered a slight grunt of discomfort.

“Lucifer! Wake up, come on!”

Finally, after seconds that seemed last an eternity for Chloe, Lucifer’s eyelids rose slowly to let her see his dark and disoriented eyes. He quickly shut them again, though; frowning more and expressing his discontent with another grunt.

“Lucifer?”

He stared at the doors before him with growing confusion and finally noticed her presence, Chloe kneeled next to him; turning his head to give her a smile. Not big enough to reassure her, but enough to make her smile in turn.

“You do _really_ like my name, Detective… That’s flattering.” he said, his voice barely audible beyond the snaps all around them.

“Are you alright?”

“I think so...I--”

Lucifer lifted his head to look around him. He instantly tensed and shut his eyes; the wing stuck in the wall had moved, too. Chloe wasn’t a doctor specialized into celestial beings but she didn’t have to be one to understand how much he was in pain right now.

“Rectification…” Lucifer told her then, his eyes still closed and his features tensed. “I do **_not_** think so.”

“Your wing is… It’s stuck. Driven in the wall” said the young woman with a shaking voice.

He moved his neck toward the wall, frowning as he tried to remember why this was happening to him - just like she did for herself before.

“Right; I forgot this tiny detail. What about you, Detective? Are you alright?” her partner asked her.

“I’m fine. Just a pounding headache.”

She paused, shaking her head and frowning.

“That’s a miracle we’re still in one piece.”

“Speak for yourself.”

“Sorry.” she apologized with a sheepish smile while thinking. “Wait… What--What do you mean by _‘I forgot’_?

He wanted to shrug, but then clenched his fists, struggling against pain once more. Each of his movements - were they light, even to breathe - was instantly followed by a tremor all around them and some instinctive spasms from his wounded wings.

That was clearly not a good sign.

“It’s nothing. N--Nothing important, I assure you. I tried to use these _so need_ - _things_ in my back to slow down our fall and…--rotect you. At least have they been much more useful than the first time. And We are in one piece, as you said… Sort of.”

Chloe looked in turn at her partner and the slashed celestial appendage; aghast by what she just heard. She could almost hear the flesh ripping and the metal yielding with a deafening crash; and this blood splashing--

“Oh God…”

“Oh, _come on_ , Detective!” Lucifer getting annoyed and rolling his eyes. “Could you not bring **H** im up while I’m bloody stuck like this, please? **H** e surely must exult on **H** is spangled throne by seeing me using _them_ anyway…”

Whether he was trying to distract her or not from the real problem, it worked.

“ _Spangled throne?_ Really?”

“If you only knew…” said her partner with an amused smile, then letting out another groan of pain and clenching his fists.

She stopped thinking about that throne and focused on him when she heard this barely contained pain. She looked at him; his face, his sweaty temple, white-faced and the regular pain along his lips… He, who was so much in pain, and she who--

They had fallen from so high and this explosion--

If Lucifer hadn’t been here, her headache and sore muscles wouldn’t be the only things she had to worry about.

“You really must stop doing that…” Chloe whispered, shaking her head, Lucifer asking her;

“Stop doing what?”

“Saving my life at the risk of yours.”

“ _Ow._ Well...My apologies, Detective. It’s-- quite instinctive, you know.” he told her, trying to smile to her but he didn’t succeed, pain getting the upper hand on him from second to second.

“Can’t you make them disappear from that plan?” she asked him, showing his wings.

“Can’t. I--pull it out first...”

Lucifer was noticeably growing pale and Chloe had no idea how she could help him. She noticed that the blood had been flowing from the wounds while since all the time they talked together, growing the red puddle on the ground. Chloe instinctively leaned back, afraid of just touching her partner’s blood with one of her feet.

“What can I do?” she asked him, panicking. “I-- I don’t kno--”

Lucifer opened his eyes again and took her hand in his. She stared at him, his dark eyes gradually absorbing the panic fear she could no longer hold inside her. He gently squeezed her hand and smiled - ignoring the pain that was tormenting him.

“Everything is alright, Detective.”

“Everything’s alright.”, she repeated without thinking, her eyes wide-opened. “Everything’s alright…”

“Now…” Lucifer continued, pinching his lips with each syllable. “I need you to--... release my wing from the wall. Can you do this for me?”

Chloe took a deep breath and nodded, not breaking eye contact for a moment.

“Yes, I think I can.”

“Lovely.” he smiled and finally let go of her hand.

She nodded once again, almost immediately regretting that movement when she suddenly felt dizzy. She stumbled, half-kneeled near Lucifer, and held herself with one hand to the wall. She barely heard her partner calling her, keeping her eyes shut to contain this shooting pain from her left temple to the back of her neck.

Clenching her fist against the wall, the detective inhaled deeply, feeling nauseous like hell.

“Detective? Chloe?”

“I’m fine…” she murmured, opening her eyes slowly, fearing further discomfort by going faster than her injury would allow her. “I’m fine, Lucifer. Just- Feeling a bit dizzy…”

She waited; inhaling and exhaling slowly while a worried devil watched her doing so. She thought on the blood on her palm and the blood that was still running along her neck to her shoulder blades.

All things considered, she wasn’t in one piece either.

She couldn’t see the extent of her wound and feared to see it.

Another minute passed and Chloe straightened up slowly, using the wall in the process. She didn’t feel nauseous this time and was relieved about it. She stepped over Lucifer’s unwounded wing, who was quietly watching her.

She didn’t like a quiet Lucifer, definitely not.

She leaned against the wall as much gashed as the wing was, the burning heat inside the metal had cooled enough so that it felt just strange against her skin.

Her yes lingered on the bloodstained end of the wing - that blood that looked as human as hers - and she stepped back, uncertain.

Chloe opened her mouth, her lips trembling, and stared at Lucifer.

He turned his head as best as he could to look her back; the shade of a smile on his waxy face.

“You can do this.” he reassured her before she could say anything.

He began to blink and his breathing slowed; first signs of a state she wouldn’t allow him to reach without trying something. She could do this.

She **_had to_** do this.

She wouldn’t let her partner bleed to death like that.

Nodding, the young woman approached her both hands near the part of it stuck in the rock outside the elevator, avoiding to touch the dislocated joint a little below. She looked at Lucifer again, still uncertain. It was not just an arm or leg to release from that wall without any more damage; she would have preferred this.

It was a wing.

An angel wing; as much beautiful as dangerous.

She had always wondered if the wings were just a common way for angels to move somewhere else, just like the walk was for human beings. Or if they were much more than that. It seemed so, judging by the sharp cut along the strong metallic wall of the elevator. From where she was standing, Chloe could now catch a glimpse of the chaos outside; the stone easily slice like butter, reinforced concrete cracked apart as far as she was able to see, higher than the elevator.

Those things were weapons.

An unpredictable weapon whose stillness totally depended on Lucifer’s will who was already struggling against the welcoming doors of oblivion.

“I--will… not move…”

Chloe looked down at her partner. As exhausted as he was, she nevertheless saw that unbending will in his eyes, not being sure it was enough.

But he would never lie to her, would he?

And certainly not at the cost of her own safety. He was in pain because she came before everything else, even his own life… His pain.

She could trust this, trust him.

Lucifer was the Devil; he could endure this.

Inhaling deeply, the detective approached her hands from the end of the wing again. She placed one near the hole and the other a little above the dislocated joint, one last look at Lucifer.

_“One.”_

_“Two…”_

Chloe tightened her grip around the wing and pulled it towards her with all her strengths. it didn’t seem to move at first, but Chloe didn’t stop pulling. Lucifer kept his word; he did not move an inch, stillness on the ground, clenching his fists.

Not a single move.

But, instead, a heartbreaking scream to which the detective nearly let go her grip.

A shower of blood splashed the top of his suit and most of his face; as the detective’s who was still pulling. Fresh blood began to soak the feathers under her palms, running down her fingers and along her wrist.

She started to get weaker, losing her grip on it…

_“Come on...”_

_“Come on!”_

**_“Come on!!”_ **

Then she heard a noise, followed with a slight shaking beneath her fingers.

Finally, a terrible snap - like a bone breaking under pressure - echoed to her pulling, the celestial appendage beginning to surrender. Taken by surprise, Chloe fell backwards with one last bloody shower. Lucifer arched his back, also taken by surprise with violent pain and screamed louder. The young woman hit the opposite wall of her right shoulder and cried when she saw the wing hit her in turn. Moving to her human throat, totally unable to survive to a divine assault.

That contact between this deadly divinity and her tender flesh never came, though.

Chloe stared blankly at the sharp feathers, suddenly stopped in its tracks, and almost tickling her glistening skin with sweat and blood.

Stopped by a nonstandard will.

Devilish, even.

She looked down and met Lucifer’s unfocused eyes, shaking from head to toe - to the end of this vengeful wing - with this will contest.

His instinct against his will.

The wing shook a little bit and abruptly vanished with a breath of air sprinkled with blood beads.

And Lucifer dropped his head to the ground, panting and blank stare. Chloe jerkily filled her lungs with air, still in shock. Shaking from head to toe, she quickly kneeled beside her partner; calling him with deep concern in her voice.

“Lucifer? Hey…”

His eyes seemed looking through her, far beyond the borders of this reality, right in front of that oblivion she feared to see him reach.

“Lucifer?”

And he saw her. She knew it as soon as he began to smile at her; as soon as he tried to, at least. She could no longer the slightest pain on his features, and it worried her even more than his brief absence. Chloe put her hand on his cheek, squeezing his hand with the other to bring him back to her.

His smile widened as his eyelids gradually fell on the glimmer of his eyes, his big relief.  

“--old you so.”

His voice was barely a whisper along her skin.

“What? Told me what?”

“A Devil… of my word.”

His cheek weighted lightly against her palm and his eyes gave up for oblivion, Chloe started panicking again and crying again the Devil’s name. Cursing with equal ardor his **F** ather’s.  

 

 

**_TBC with..._ ** "Forgive me Father."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let a comment as always !   
> I don't know when the next chapter will be translated (still another one to finish, right Navaros ? ^^) I'll do my best, as always.   
> Thanks for reading me guys ! 
> 
> See you soon ! :3


	5. Forgive me Father

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm just finished to translate ! Gos-- ! It took hours OO   
> But I'm glad to publish again :) Aren't you?   
> Nano is finally come to an end and I'll finally write without word-count pressure ^^ it was great, but so exhausting ! As a reward for everyone, this new translated chapter !   
> I re-read the whole thing, but still not beta-checked. Could be some mistakes left here and there, sorry ^^' 
> 
> Enjoy !

 

 

**FORGIVE ME FATHER**

 

_“How you are fallen from heaven, morning star, son of the dawn! You have been cast down to the earth, you who once laid low the nations!”_ – Isaiah 14;12

__

That shooting pain between his shoulder blades was the first thing he felt.

Like his heart decided to move to his back and beat there more frantically than it ever did before.

_Such an odd feeling…_

He knew for sure that a moving organ was quite unusual, not a normal thing at all. For himself and for anyone else.

The rest of his body was heavy – like lead -, he couldn’t even move his fingers against that cold floor that seemed to be his bed until now. And even if he could, he didn’t want to endure this pain in the rest of his body while it was just tormenting a tiny area so far.

One pleasure at a time, right?

Not that he was following this restrictive reasoning for other activities.

The limbo seemed to want to keep him with it and he didn’t mind, emerging from time to time and only when the pain was unbearable – digging into his flesh and burning his nerve endings. Always further, always stronger. He felt curious to discover what was causing this torment, but the thought didn’t last long in his mind. A light breeze of lucidity taken away by a strong wave of sensations.

He wasn’t sleeping. Not awake either.

That felt… strange.

How could he feel and yet not totally… _feel?_

It was--

Then came a sudden change in his muddled sensations. A sudden increase of pain between his shoulder blades. It couldn’t come from him; he couldn’t move. And as powerful as it was, the Limbo couldn’t either. It was something else.

He felt that other thing slipping, briefly touching a spot of his, where his right shoulder should be.

And then came a moan that replaced his fierce will and filled the quiet space all around him.

_“Bloody Hell…”_

“Lucifer?”

Did he think out loud?

Maybe.

The dark Limbo faded almost obediently around him, strongly increasing the pain as much as his sensations that were previously muffled. He could now feel the touch of the fabric under his cheek, the cold metal beneath him, and that hand – not his – that was stroking his cheek.

“Lucifer?”

_“Chloe?”_

Was that really her?

“Yes, it’s me; I’m right here.”

He had thought out loud, there was no doubt now.

“Can you open your eyes?” Chloe asked, her hand running down his cheek again.

Well… That was tricky.

Touching him like this to support her request and do whatever she wanted with him… She had a gift for that. Such a little devil on her own.

Opening his eyes was much less painful than what he feared.

It was just… exhausting.

Lucifer blinked, having some difficulties to see clearly at first. He looked what was right before him, still stunned.

Was that--… knees?

Slowly, the Devil looked up, running his feverish gaze along a crinkled sky-blue skirt that was covered of dried blood. Lucifer frowned, wondering from where that amount of blood could come.

Was somebody hurt? Was he?

The hand on his cheek ran its fingers across the line of his chin, leading his eyes even higher; to a known face.

_Chloe._

“Hey.”, she only said with a smile.

“Hey.”

He frowned again, not liking at all the obvious weakness in his voice. Why was he feeling that way? So much weak, on a physical level? Even if Chloe was here with him, it wasn’t enough to explain his actual state. Lucifer tried to focus, annoyed when he noticed that he couldn’t gather his thoughts properly. Was that typically _human_ not to be able to remember a few things preceding the darkness?

What he knew came down to a few things, too; he was lying on his side – and not in a bed -, the detective had a large amount of blood on her clothes and his own jacket had been used to support his head, like a pillow.

He couldn’t say which of those worried him the most.

“What did I miss?” he managed to ask right after moistening his lips.

Not much, he guessed.

Still the same elevator car with its dented ceiling and tons of concrete above, and this blood…

Right, he remembered now; it was _his_. His blood that was making a nearly perfect circle on the ground in front of him, behind the detective.

Wasn’t that where he was before? Maybe… Everything was still fuzzy in his mind.

His gaze lingered on the big gap in the wall.

Then he remembered.

The fall.

 

**-xXx-**

**_“Chloe!”_ **

**_“Lucifer!”_ **

_His nails scratch the metal, trying to hold on to it with all his strength._

_It’s stupid._

_That will not save them._

_They are falling._

_Fast._

_Too fast._

_A strong bump against the wall outside and he is thrown forward. His right side hits the doors and he falls face down on the ground, stopping to breathe with the impact. Something warm runs down his chin. Something tasting like iron on his tongue._

_He can’t breathe; his lungs obstructed by so many things; pain, fear, adrenaline… He opens his mouth, the air refuses to go into his throat; it is devoured by sparkles, the speed of their fall. And that pain that keeps digging into his chest…_

_The metal squeals along the wall outside without slowing down their fall._

_He hears her screaming. Close to him, scared to death._

_Lucifer tries to get up._

_Difficult. Very difficult…_

_There is not much time left._

_He’s looking for her; beyond smoke and stifling sparkles._

_He sees her in front of him and dives forward on the spur of the moment, helped by another strong bump of the elevator car against the concrete walls. A deadly corridor to which he will not giving up. He dives to her and grabs her, muffling her cry against his shirt. His shoulder violently hits the wall and he winces in pain._

_Just a few seconds left before--…_

_Lucifer has no more time to think. He holds Chloe tightly against him…_

_And spreads out his wings._

 

**-xXx-**

Chloe brought him back to the present moment, far from his wings and still so close to the pain they were putting himself to.

“Not much.”, she confirmed. “As you can see, we’re still stuck under tons of debris.”

“Great… I thought I missed the show.”

He then noticed the piece of fabric basically wrapped around his partner’s head.

“You’ve been hurt.”

“Mmh? Ow, this? It’s nothing.”, she said, moving her hand to her temple; where the fabric had turned dark with blood. “Nothing serious, really.”

He lifted his head a little bit, hardly gulping.

He was so thirsty…

“How long have I been--…?”

“A while.”, answered Chloe. “It’s probably the price to pay for saving my life at the risk of yours!”

Lucifer laughed; he tried to, quickly groaning his discomfort before replying;

“Have you ever heard that the Devil is free of his own moves, no matter what?”

“Sounds familiar, yeah.”

She looked at him, her brow furrowed with concern.

“How are you feeling?”

He barely stopped himself to shrug, being cautious, and just smiled to her. It wanted to be comforting, when the situation was not.

“Like I’ve had rough sex with every hordes of Hell at the same time… Need more details, Detective?”

“Bawdy comments, inappropriate talk… It bodes well, isn’t it?”

He didn’t refute.

What was the point of worrying her more than she already did?

Lucifer turned his head to the ceiling instead – moving as much as the pain allowed him – and looked at the damage. Judging by the rain of dust that was falling beneath the metal, Coleman’s bombs had done a great job here. The structure of the building had been weakened over time and any maintenance; which had collapsed for good right after the deflagration. This narrow elevator car was what seemed to be the safer place in the building.

Wonderful.

“Speaking of… What about _‘help’s on the way’_ and all that?”

“I dunno.”, the detective confessed, and she got up.

She sat near him, sighing.

“Coleman did a great job with his little bombs; they’ll need time to get us out of here… If help knows where to look. Dan could track down my car, but--”

“But we can’t contact them to speed up, can we?”

How long would it take to this known douche to raise the alarm? Lucifer was tempted to bet for a few days at best, instead of a few hours. He sighed in turn and closed his eyes; it couldn’t become that bad, could it?

“We can’t. My phone is dead and yours stayed in the car. I’m not sure it’ll be useful, though.”, she told him, shaking her head. “With those tons of concrete that felt above our heads… Not a chance to find any signal from here.”

“It seems we are stuck.”

Chloe nodded.

“It seems so.”, she said. “And it’s all my fault.’

“Your fault?”

Lucifer moved his head, puzzled, putting aside the stabbing pain in his back to stare at the detective’s tormented profile right above him.

She stretched her legs before her as much as she could, avoiding to plunge her heels on her partner’s blood and she shook her head again, her features marked by guilt, which he did his best to understand. Not succeeding, though.

“I should have listened to Dan. I should have listened to you and wait for backup before--… And now, you’re--… We’re--…

She didn’t finish her sentence, nibbling her lower lip.

“This is my fault.”

Sighing when he heard that most ludicrous guilt trip, Lucifer began to sit up. Chloe noticed it and complained about it quickly.

“Lucifer, what the hell are you thinking you’re doing?! Stay lying down!”

Disregarding her complains, he leaned on his arms and groaned as soon as he moved away his chest from the ground.

_Bloody Hell_ … It hurt like hell, indeed.

Not enough to stop him, though. He was the Devil. This kind of torment… He could manage. What he couldn’t manage was that guilt on his partner’s face. He finally managed, after many groans and thanks to his strong will, to sit down and carefully press his back against the wall.

Such devious pain…

But tolerable.

“Lucifer--”

He took a deep breath – mouth closed – to dispel the dizziness that was seizing him and moved his arm to Chloe. He placed his hand on her shoulder and gently pushed her towards his; she fought it a little bit before closing the gap between them without saying a word. She hesitated, then pressing her cheek against his chest; like he did before. Lucifer winced, the gap between his shoulder blades widening until it reached his hairline.

He shut his eyes and stroke her shoulder.

“Unless your name is Coleman and that you enjoy turpentine on bombs too much, I can’t be agreed with you, Detective.”, he said. “This is not your fault. It goes with the job, that’s all. All we have to do is wait for help… Daniel won’t be long to save us.”

Chloe lifted her head and Lucifer opened his eyes to look at her.

“Are you trying to comfort me or your faith in Dan is much stronger than I thought?”

He smiled.

“I do not lie, remember?” he replied.

It made her laugh a bit and he could imagine her rolling her eyes. Neither of them released the other, finding in this simple embrace a peace they were desperately looking for while waiting for help. Lucifer didn’t even realize that his eyes were shut again, focusing on that touch and the pleasant feeling it was giving him; this paced breathing against his chest and this cheek pressed against his heart… He could have stayed like this forever and never comply about it.

“It could take a while.”, Chloe sighed.

“I’d be glad to do some funny things with you, dear, but I’m afraid I’m not feeling well enough for that.”, Lucifer joked, keeping his eyes shut.

“That’s not what I had in mind.”

“Ow. What a shame…”

“I thought we could… talk.”, then said the detective.

Lucifer opened his eyes and looked at her.

“Talk?”

She nodded, not telling much. He didn’t need this to guess where the talk might lead them both, anyway.

He hardly gulped.

“Well… If that’s what you want, but… Do you have a specific topic in mind?”

“Maybe I do.”

He waited, feeling in her eyes that desire of truth. This very specific curiosity for a very specific topic. She wanted the truth; he couldn’t blame her for that. He just thought… telling her everything somewhere else than a stifling elevator car.

This place wasn’t his first choice.

Definitely not.

“Seventy-one brothers and sisters, uh?”, the detective asked him with a knowing smile.

Lucifer laughed softly, as surprised as relieved.

He knew, however, that his profuse celestial siblings didn’t interest her that much to ask; not as much as the eternal question he refused to give an answer.

She was giving in.

At least for now.

“Forty-eight brothers and twenty-three sisters, to be exact. I’d be more than pleased to tell you each of their names, but I doubt it’s the best way for us to stay awake while waiting for help.”

“You make a point.”, said his partner. “What about this throne, then?”

“Careful now, Detective.”, he warned her. “Making fun of God, this is not sound.”

“ _Said_ the Devil sit right next to me.”, she replied. “So… your **F** ather has a spangled throne? For real?”

Lucifer shrugged and held back a slight grunt of discomfort.

He was right from the start - no matter what Linda or even Chloe could say about it, both careful and full of hope -, his wings were a curse; not a blessing. Although they were now gone from this reality, the Devil could still feel them. The friction of the feathers on his skin, the skinned bone against his spine and the blood that was still flowing along it - out of time and space, but still there. Sticky, warm… while the rest of his body was not.

That was interesting.

Troubling, but nevertheless interesting.

Lucifer had never been cold in his life.

No more during his first years of existence than during his decline.

Angels didn’t feel cooler temperatures as humans did for millennia. Their metabolism being much stronger than theirs, they could get used to anything - even a change of temperature.

So it was with celestial lineage.

He held a shiver back, fascinated by this all new sensation.

Why was he cold?

Maybe it had something to do with his wings. Yes, that was possible. He could not be absolutely sure of this, though. Lucifer had always taken great care of his appendages, even during Rebellion. Truth be told, those ones were not easily damaged; whether he’s been fighting one of his many siblings or not.

He frowned.

Not a chance of damage with his siblings, but… as far as a living miracle was concerned…

He was vulnerable near the detective, _completely_ vulnerable.

Speaking of curse…

The longer he stayed with Chloe, the more his wings would take time to recover. He just hoped that Daniel would find them before he lost his very last drop of blood. Out of this reality, of course.

He focused on the detective again, not seeing the point to share that information with her. There was none. She would go crazy with worry, for sure; and as always.

“You might think it is when you look at it; billions of glittering flakes, all frozen into a single rock for a single being.”

“No true divine flakes, then? That’s disappointing.” Chloe teased him.

“Sorry, but no.”

“If that so… What’s inside the rock?”

 Lucifer didn’t answer right away, lost in thought. Thoughts miles away from this elevator car, far away from this fragile planet. Far, in the outer limits of skies; in a very specific city with equally special people. That huge hall whose had only been built to be forever singing a **S** elfish **B** astard’s praises.

_“A throne? Why?”_

_“We aren’t supposed to question **H** is **O** rders.”_

_“What about **H** is **S** anity, then? **H** e doesn’t even have a physical form; so what’s the point?” _

_“Samael-…”_

_“I am not supposed to question **H** is **O** rders. Like I didn’t know…”_

A smile appeared on his lips; it was not one of those smug or tempting grins that made his reputation. That one was soft, so soft that it almost looked like it didn’t even exist.

“Stars.”, he said, his voice barely a whisper.

“Stars? But how-?”

“Remember who I am, Detective. Well… who I _used_ to be, back then.”

He felt more than he saw her lift her head to stare at his face.

“You were known as the… hum… the Lightbringer, is that it? The one who enlightened the skies after God asked him so, from what I heard.”

“From what it _was_ , if you asked me. All true, Detective. I did enlighten the entire universe and far more than that.”

“Wow…” she exclaimed, sounding marveled. “I’m sitting right next to the angel who created the Sun…” she said then lower, stunned.

“ _Fallen_ angel.”

“And you placed stars into your **F** ather’s throne.”, continued Chloe, not seeming to listen to him, sounding even more awe-struck than before.

“It was more complicated than that, but yes, we could say it that way. **H** e wanted a throne. Why? ‘Don’t know and never asked, but **H** e got what **H** e wanted. It took me ages to create each star… I could have done something else of my time, something clever!”

“I guess so. What did it look like? Is it still there? I mean… in Heaven?”

“My **F** ather would never have destroyed my skill, Detective; even after my terrible Rebellion. It was perfect and will forever be; **H** e knew it. Then yes, I do think that the throne is still there, sparkling with pure Light and according to this **I** mmaterial **D** ouche’s mood.”

“What do you mean by that… _according to the mood_?”

Lucifer didn’t answer, his attention unwittingly caught by the pain in his back. Not just there, now. That was strange, the way how the pain ran everywhere after a time while his back was the only injured part of his body. And now, he had to endure this sharp tip along his right side. He could feel it move under his skin, right beneath his ribs with each of his new attempt of breathing. He tried to shift a bit without disturbing Chloe or arouse more physical discomfort inside him, slowly exhaling while he couldn’t get rid of this pressure in his side.

“Stars are an extent of Divine power, vessels for The Very First Light; God… and Mother, of course. Thus, they reflected some sort of luminous version of what **H** is emotions could be at the time. In the entire hall. That was quite a show to see… For anyone else than me.”, he said, just in case that Chloe misunderstood him.

“Like those rings you can buy on the beach.”

“Looks like it, yes.”

“How was it? Was it dark for anger or-…?” she tried to guess by herself, intrigued by that kind of Light.

“It wasn’t dark, no. White.”

“White?”

“A bright, fierce light.” Lucifer told her, tensed. “Searing like the Fires of Hell will ever be, freezing like your earthly poles will ever be. It engulfed absolutely everything in its way.”

A shiver grazed his spine and he closed his free hand into a fist to keep some control on himself, on his thoughts, his memories. He didn’t notice right away that Chloe hadn’t talk since he did. He looked down and met her eyes that were filled with pity and concern - he despised that. He managed to smile, trying to talk in a lighter tone;

“It hadn’t been easy to see the world again after my fall! Not into the stifling darkness of Hell, moreover…”

His **F** ather’s blinding wrath was not the only responsible for this, though. Hell hadn’t the endless light of heavens, nor of Silver City’s. It was a dark place; not a star to guide him through it, to comfort him or even heal his countless wounds and burns. A dead land that had been eager to eat him like everything else. It had taken him quite a long time to see again and more than that to adjust his sight to this endless night around him.

Hell had been a great opportunity, in a way. A chance – bound to happen, yes – to push himself and take knowledge of what he was truly capable of to survive. Thousands of eviscerated monsters, all killed from his hands – their putrescent blood that had run along his skin for decades – could testify that.

Going through millennia, he had even found since some comfort into the eternal darkness. Some peace that was fed by it; in so many ways.

The detective saw through him, however. She kept looking at him. Pressing her cheek against his heart, Lucifer knew what her next question would be way before she even dared to ask him.

“How was it?”

“How was what, Detective?”

“Your fall.”

Lucifer took a deep breath, flinching as he felt the pain bit his back.

“This isn’t something funny to tell.”, he tried to dodge. “Why wouldn’t I tell you about Amenadiel and his brutal encounter with a flock of birds?”

His eyes met hers, Chloe not interested by his proposition, funnier than what she wanted to hear from him. She didn’t insist, though; smiling at him warmly. She shrugged.

“Whatever suits you.”, she gave in without further explanation.

He didn’t know if it was that docile and sympathetic renunciation, or that smile that had appeared on her tired face; that was responsible for what was going to follow. Exhaustion could be the one and only thing to blame here. Still, Lucifer didn’t talk about the angry birds and his brother’s shame.

His next words were completely different.

“I thought it all the way through… All the way through. I thought things would calm down on their own. It wasn’t the first fight we had, **H** e and I; nor the last. It looked like the only way to really talk to **H** im, you know? This hasn’t changed, I supposed. The only way apart from orders and vital missions. Fighting was always preferable to this cold silence from **H** is side. Well, that’s what I thought at the time.”

Lucifer was looking straight ahead.

“It was just another quarrel, just another one. But… It soon appeared that I had stepped over the line this time. Everyone was standing there, all gathered into a round stoicism, all of them gathered around the… _traitor_ I was. Not a son, not a brother; a traitor. All brothers, all sisters of mine… my Mother; every one of them stoic around me. Not a single one even flinched or showed some compassion when they all saw me fall. Not a single one…” Lucifer whispered, then letting out a resentful exclamation.

Amenadiel, Michael, Uriel, Sachiel…

He could still see their impassive face as clearly as the wall in front of him.

_“Mother! Mom, please!”_

_“…”_

_“Do as I say, Michael! Take him now, Son.”_

_“Michael, come on! Th-This is insane!”_

_“…”_

_“Michael! Don’t!”_

“And what about your wings?”

Lucifer jumped when he heard Chloe’s question, leaving behind this former pain to welcome another.

“Excuse me?”

“Your wings. You still had them when you fell, didn’t you? Could they not act against it?”

“I’d liked that but unfortunately not, Detective. It wasn’t a common fall ruled by some gravity and dexterity of mine. My fall was quite different.”, he explained to her after clearing his throat. “My **F** ather has turned against me the power **H** e gave me before.”

“You’re talking about that divine light, right?”

“Precisely. I met every star I created that day; not in a fun way. I never feared their heat before; why would I? They were part of me.”

He sighed, ignoring the tip hitting his side, and squeezed the detective’s shoulder harder. He rubbed his free hand against his pants, lost in thought. Then, his eyes met the big red mark at the other end of the elevator car. A hue that had followed him for centuries, and even longer than that.

Until a few weeks ago.

“Once arrived in Hell, I was… someone else. I could no longer see, but I could feel the difference inside my body. Everywhere, actually. It was far deeper than a simple physical form. The stars, this Light hadn’t just burned my flesh… It had burned any physical and spiritual connection to home – what I thought being home, should I say. And for what? Bloody free will! _Tch!_ “

He shook his head gently.

“I couldn’t go back there even if I wanted to. I could no longer hear their voices, the familiar sounds from the Silver City… I was all alone. For the very first time of my really long life. It was really strange to experiment.”, he said, frowning.

A moment passed with none of them speaking; Lucifer thinking back to that heavy silence that had met his cries of rage and despair into complete darkness. Wondering how humans could enjoy solitude, and even look for it.

They were so strange for so many things.

Chloe broke the silence between them again.

“These burns… You did try to show them to me; in the lab.”

“I couldn’t have said it better, Detective. Things hadn’t gone as I planned. You should have seen my real face, but it vanished somehow and I didn’t know at the time.”

He slightly laughed.

“How curious is this… You see, I can’t recall since when I hoped for getting rid of this face and now that it’s done, I-…I feel… I feel _empty_. Like I’ve lost something truly valuable to me. Strange, don’t you think?”

His wings made their apparition, instead. Well… not really. With or without them, Lucifer was still feeling empty inside; these heavy things worsened the sensation at best.  

“I’m sorry.”, the detective suddenly apologized.

“Sorry? What for?” asked Lucifer, puzzled.

He felt her slightly move away from his chest and saw her shaking her head, guided by an emotion he could not yet identify. She said she was sorry, but-

What for exactly?

“I can only imagine how hard it must have been for you.”, she said, looking for his eyes. “And I-I just… send you packing. I am so sorry, Lucifer… Sorry that I didn’t believe you that day, that I didn’t even try to.”

“How could you?” he tried to reassure her, quite disturbed by the intensity of her gaze. “It looked like another nonsensical metaphor to you; how could you kno--“

“That’s it! You’re not a liar, Lucifer. I know that, even before all… _this_.”, she told him, pointing to his back.

“But I do not tell the whole truth.”, he replied, repeating her own words – first his own, actually.

She stared at him and he smiled at her, his hand still resting on her shoulder.

“So… It seems we’re both responsible for this disaster; won’t you agree, Detective?”

She smiled in turn, laughing softly. She nodded and moved closer to him, willingly granting;

“It appears so, yeah.”

Then, Chloe lifted her hand and ran her fingers over his cheek, Lucifer shuddering at her touch. He didn’t protest, pressing his cheek against her palm without thinking. That felt nice. She was looking at him, looking at his face… and the one she could not see. That she never could.

“Can you describe it?”

“Hm?” he mumbled, lost into pleasant sensations given by his partner.

“Your face.”, clarified Chloe.

“ _Ow!_ Well… It’s- It’s quite the same that a burned face, I guess. In a more… infernal way. The skin is crazed in places, everywhere to be honest. It’s feeling cold outside, but inside… Inside, there is this endless, suffocating heat. Like a lava flow right beneath your wounded skin; it defaces each of your nerves with noteworthy perseverance.”

“Sounds terrible.”

“You get used to it over time.”, Lucifer toned down. “It’s over, anyway.”

She let her thumb run along his jaw, pensive. She then lowered her hand and leaned back comfortably against his chest; asking to him a few seconds later:

“How did it happen? How can it be gone like that?”

“I have no idea. Amenadiel does have an absurd theory about it, but--“

“Does he? Which one?”

Lucifer sighed, groaning soon after. He focused on his breathing, tensing a bit before the pain finally let him some space.

“God might have forgiven me for my faults, that’s what he thinks. Forgiven Devil, forgiven face, it seems! And I don’t even mention these bloody things in my back…”

“And you don’t think that’s all about forgiveness?”

He barely held back another resentful exclamation and glared at the ceiling.

“ _Forgiven_ … Me? I just wanted to be free, Detective. There’s no point to forgive that.”

He felt her shrug, then assuming;

“Could be something else, y’know?”

“Can’t wait to hear it…” whispered Lucifer, exhausted. “What could have possibly wanted my **F** ather by stealing my Devil face and giving my wings back?”

“Apologize.”

“I beg your pardon?” he exclaimed, caught off guard.

“Could be, don’t you think? Parents aren’t perfect, Lucifer. They make mistakes, too. And maybe… maybe that your **F** ather feels bad about you and the way **H** e kicked you out of the house. You wanted to have free will, you said it yourself. So… Y’know the saying…”, she finished. “ _Better late than never._ ”

Lucifer didn’t know what he could answer to this. He was surprised to want to believe it. A desire that pierced through his chest, stronger than that sneaky tip ever did.

He did want to believe this. To turn this tiny possibility into absolute truth.

But this possibility was born from human naivety, from which Lucifer was very far away.

While he was so close to the truth, Chloe had only grazed its surface.

And maybe was it for the best.

There were some things about him it was preferable to keep in the dark.

Deep within Darkness.

**_Tbc with…_** “Inherently divine”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So much stuff to talk about, right?   
> Let a comment as always, I love them ! I do, I reaaly do =3 Go, go, go! 
> 
> I'm writing the third chapter for "Leap of Faith" in french, so the second in english should come very soon, guys and girls ;) Be prepared!   
> See you soon !


	6. Inherently divine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go! Finally, another chapter.
> 
> Sorry for the waiting; doing my best but it’s still not enough ☹
> 
> Still not beta-checked, but let’s hope all the mistakes will disappear under your eyes ^^

 

 

**INHERENTLY DIVINE**

  
  
 

“Why just seventy-one?”

“Hmm ...? W’did y’say?”

 Lucifer stirred slightly against her, pulled out of his sleepiness by her unexpected question. It had been a while since none of them had spoken; both slowly drained of their strength by their respective wounds and this never-ending wait. They had been sitting there for so long ... and the few breathable air contained in the elevator car was gradually declining, they couldn’t do anything to stop it. They could only wait and stay quiet so as not to waste their chance of going out from here alive; both of them.

The words had come out of Chloe's mouth before she could hold them back.

Many things - some of them were pointless and others were more relevant, even disturbing - had crossed her mind since they were stuck here. Wait and think; that was her only options. Wait for help. She thought;  _"Will they arrive_   _in time or ... Or will the air be gone first?”,_   _“How many bits and pieces between us and the rescue team?_ ”, _“What would Dan tell to Trixie?”_

The anxiety suffocating her more efficiently than this warm thin air, the detective had turned her thoughts towards a totally different direction. Better escaping the real life for a less conventional world. That was how she had come to think about Lucifer's words for no other purpose than turning her mind away from their frightful reality.

“At the precinct **...** You said you have seventy-one siblings. And before that, you said that someone was missing. ‘Can’t remember the name..." whispered Chloe, peeling her sweaty shirt off her skin.

She thought she had spoken too low to be heard - it might be possible after all, the stifling heat of the metallic room seemed to engulf everything, even her words - because Lucifer didn’t react immediately. He was still against her shoulder, Chloe having preferred to release him from her embrace a few hours earlier so as not to bother him further. He hadn’t talked much about his state and neither had she, already suspecting the worse. She was no sucker. Sitting shoulder against shoulder, Chloe moved her hand under his arm and placed his hand in hers. Without opening his eyes, Lucifer instinctively tightened his fingers around hers; frowning harder while the pain acted the same. Her thumb ran along her partner’s palm, still surprised to not feel the same unpleasant wetness that wasn’t leaving her. That different temperature was almost disturbing, but not that much incredible, on the other hand. After all, Lucifer wasn’t  _really_  human. And Hell had to be noticeably warmer than this place, though that last thought was only a simple supposition based on popular beliefs.

She would ask him later.

If they ever get out from here ...

"Uriel," he said, hardly swallowing.

“Uriel?” repeated Chloe.

“My little brother. He’s dead." Lucifer quickly told her, like a dressing swiftly removed from a skinned wound.

_Uriel._

That was the first time she heard that name. And the first time she heard about death with these divine creatures, which also included her partner, fallen divine creature of the sort or not.

“Dead? But ... I thought the angels immortal?”

Lucifer sighed and opened his eyes, looking straight ahead, carefully stretching his neck with the young woman’s worried look on him.

He was white as a sheet…

Almost as white as his shirt. If that made any kind of difference. She quickly reassured herself, however; noticing the bright artificial light inside the elevator, which was flickering more and more often - it would have excessively turning anyone pale. She wasn’t at her best advantage either.

“We are. ‘Most of the time.”

_"_ _One_ _angel can hurt another."_

She remembered the time Lucifer said those exact words. She also remembered how he had stared at her right after that, his obsession for her back...

_"Because I want to know if you’re an angel sent to destroy me."_

Did he finally know?

Was she?

Chloe shook her head and almost rolled her eyes for thinking such kind of things.

No, that was stupid.

So stupid.

She has nothing _divine_. Nothing more divine than any other human being, at least, they were all born from a divine action that she could no longer deny from now on. She was born, like everyone else. She had grown up, like everyone else. She had nothing special.

_"_ _Other than_ _make the Devil physically vulnerable …"_

She looked at Lucifer, squeezing his hand a little more in hers, pained for his lost.

“I'm sorry for your brother.”

“Don’t be, Detective. We weren’t really close, as you can imagine.”

Chloe lifted her head to the ceiling, her attention caught by an indistinct noise that wasn’t coming from her or Lucifer. It sounded like a friction, she wasn’t sure. She listened carefully but just heard Lucifer's breathing and hers filling space. Maybe she had dreamed this? She was so tired ... Her mind starting playing tricks on her like that didn’t surprise her that much.

“What happened?” she asked him, lowering her head.

He laughed. Sort of. It sounded more like an amused coughing than a real laugh to her. His features tensed for a moment and he took a deep breath; trying to hide his pain under the shadow of a smile.

“You do really want to broach the saddest topics, don’t you?” he pointed out to her.

“Maybe because our situation here is sad as well.” she replied with a smirk.

Sad ... Heartbreaking, even.

" _Oh woman of little faith ..."_ he recited, giving her an amused look. “When I think that you doubted about my faith in the detective douche just a few hours ago...”

She laughed in turn, shrugging.

“Never had a leap of faith, for anything. I’m like St. Thomas.”

“You’d sleep with half of the disciples, really? Awe-inspiring, Detective.”

“What? Jesus, no! I would never!” she exclaimed, shocked; then staring at Lucifer. “But-… You mean that-… Thomas and Jesus’s disciples?”

Lucifer's smile widened.

“ _Saint_ is just a title.”

“Wow ...” Chloe gasped, stunned. “But no. I wasn’t thinking about this part. And I don’t want to.” she complained, rubbing her forehead. “I only believe in what I can see.”

He turned his head slightly towards her, his tired eyes meeting hers.

"They'll get us out of here," he said reassuringly. “We just have to be patient. You will be back home -and to your offspring - much faster than you think. Or believe.”

She smiled and stroked his hand with her thumb, resting her other hand on his arm.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, Detective.”

She sat down again comfortably beside him, together in silence. A minute passed, peacefully suffocating.

Maybe two.

“How was he? Uriel?”

She had only met Amenadiel; - an encounter or two, at best – from all of his siblings. She doubted she would ever meet others one day. Lucifer was logically no longer welcome and the angels mingled on rare occasions with mortals. Amenadiel was far away, physically speaking, from his brother. Even their personality seemed at opposites poles.

“He was a real pain in the ass.” said her partner.

Not that “opposites poles”, then.

“Looks like it runs in the family, mh?” she teased him.

He turned his head slightly towards her, giving her a half-amused, half-angry look.

“But he wasn’t as attractive as I am!”

“Of course, he wasn’t. And what else?”

“He'd always been the frailest, as far as I can remember.”

Chloe frowned.

“I thought you were all ...  _perfect_ ; physically speaking, I mean." she said.

“Our growth is quite similar to yours, you humans.” explained Lucifer, resting the back of his head against the wall. “It’s more or less the same.”

“Tell me more about it.”

“Well, we are growing up - over a period of time quite different from yours, it goes without saying - until we reach our physical maturity. And our body develops differently according to our ... abilities.”

She couldn’t help but smile. So he had been a child, too. She listened quietly to Lucifer explaining as best as he could what made angels different from human beings - apart from their straight connection to the Divine -, trying to imagine him younger and more innocent.

Too bad there was any photo album at his penthouse.

A Lucifer’s eight years old version would definitely worth the journey.

“Sachiel, for instance, is able to control people’s mind. Her power doesn’t depend on physical strength, but rather on mental strength. She doesn’t have Gabrielle’s build who fulfills the job of messenger and warrior like Michael or Amenadiel. These three are part of the _beefy squad,_ as I called them...”

“And what about you?”

“Me?”

“Hmm ... Aren’t you one of those beefy guys? I thought better of you!”

She looked at the ceiling again, staring at the flickering light for a moment before looking away. She was sure she heard another strange noise. After all this time being stuck here ... There was no risk that everything would collapse on them now, right?

_“Just stop thinking the worst, Chloe...”_

Lucifer laughed softly, it stopped as soon as it started. So short that the detective didn’t notice. She was also struggling to breathe in this overheated metal jail.

"I'm much more complex than they will ever be, Detective.” he said. “My abilities are a subtle blend of these two opposites. Mastering Light in all its forms is not given to everyone.”

“Only to the best, huh?” Chloe supposed with a smile on the corner of her lips.

“Exactly.”

“So ... Uriel was one of those who used their mind more than their body, wasn’t he?”

A mocking exclamation came from her partner.

“ _More_  isn’t strong enough to describe him; he spent most of his time boasting about his _unerring_ – like he said - predictions. A wanky short-arse with wings, that's what he was, for sure...”

“His predictions, you say?” repeated the young woman, leaning more comfortably against the wall.

“Mhhh ... ‘Wasn’t a soothsayer, strictly speaking, but still... He managed to see every possible action that would lead to other possible events followed by other actions and so on.”

_“A butterfly flapping its wings in New York can bring the storm to Beijing…"_  mechanically recited the detective.

“Something like that, yes. Uriel rather spoke of intertwined yarns, a complex painting that he was using like he wanted. ‘Didn’t help him much the last time we met, though...”

“Why not?” asked Chloe. “What happened?”

She soon suspected that this topic was much more difficult to broach, Lucifer's prolonged silence was quite revealing. Nevertheless, she wanted to know. Lucifer made a vague movement with his free hand.

“He's dead, here’s what happened. Aren’t you thirsty, Detective?” he asked suddenly - to change the subject, most likely. “I’d kill for a drop of water..”

“No, ‘m not. But how could he die? Your brother seemed to always know where he was going, right? And even without that, I guess killing an angel isn’t as simple as killing a human being, am I wrong?”

Chloe suspected that Uriel's death was certainly not accidental; she could tell it just by seeing Lucifer’s tension. But some details still didn’t fit; surely because he hadn’t told her much about them yet. Did it have something to do with his strange vulnerability?

A terrible grinding noise ran across the ceiling and the detective lifted her head. She hadn’t imagined _that_. She waited for each new noise with growing concern.

“You heard this?” she whispered to her partner while sitting up a bit.

Receiving no answer from the Devil, she turned to him.

“Lucifer?”

Her heart missed a beat, seized by his sudden immobility beside her. Chloe instinctively put her palm against his chest, looking for his beating heart so that her own could beat again. She felt it, beyond this tension, this strange stiffness that was possessing his body without warning.

What the hell was happening to him?

She moved her hand on his shoulder, shaking him as much as she could without worrying about hurting him further. He kept his eyes closed, unresponsive to her verbal and physical calls.

“Lucifer?” she called him a second time, a warning note in her voice.

She barely managed to get a weak whistling when he tried to take a deep breath.

Definitely concerned, Chloe shook him harder and harder.

“Lucifer!”

 

**-**   **xXx**   **-**

 

So dark ...

Why was it so dark?

And cold. Freezing.

When did he turn into a frozen statue?

‘Couldn’t be ... He was the Devil. The Ruller of Hell thus turned into a vulgar snowman; it was unimaginable.

“Lucifer!”

Chloe?

Right; she had asked him a question. He wasn’t sure he could answer her, or even if he had to. How could he tell her that he had killed his own brother?

“What?!”

_Ow._

Did he think aloud?

The pain melted the frost around his numb limbs, inside his veins; digging its way to his lungs.

Such an unpleasant feeling.

“Oh God...”

**H** im again? Why were they always speaking about **H** im lately? Uriel’s death had nothing to do with his  **F** ather but everything to do with his mother. There was a difference. And also because he wanted to put an end to the detective’s life, but...

“Lucifer!  _Hey_ , Lucifer! Look at me!”

It took quite a long time before his eyelids complied with his partner’s pestering demands. How could it be so difficult to open his eyes, to keep them that way for a few seconds? He frowned, trying to focus as best he could on the blurry figure kneeling before him. Chloe was supporting his face with both hands.

So soft...

“Lucifer ... How did you get this?”

He blinked, surprised to see these strange dark clouds surrounding the edges of his sight.

“Get what?” he said.

His voice was furred, coming from far away; a kind of echo swallowed by darkness.

“This mark on your side! When did it happen?”

A mark? ‘Didn’t remember such a thing. Unless- ... Is that why he was struggling that much to fill his lungs with air instead of this liquid pressure?

“Dunno...’f...’ell, didn’t we?”

Lucifer groaned, intrigued by this whistling that answered to his lack of oxygen. He wanted more than anything to breathe, to appease the pressure around his rib cage. Nothing helped, though.

He tensed against the wall, a panicked whistling coming out of his mouth eager for air and water, the pressure around his lungs not loosening for a second. A blinding light assaulted him; then came a shadow that fell on his tired eyes.

“Lucifer, stay with me!” begged Chloe, panicking as much as he was. “Keep your eyes open for me, okay?”

Right.

The darkness faded to show him again his partner’s anxious face Why was she so anxious? She shouldn’t be. He had done the right thing ... He protected her from Uriel, from himself.

“Protected me? But- - Lucifer, stay with me! Help’s on its way; can’t you hear them? They’re right above us!”

Were they, now? No, he didn’t hear anything. Just the pain that was ripping his skin up, his nerves... absolutely everything. And his failing heartbeats in his chest.

Was this all part of **H** is Plan? He wondered. Not that he would ever have an answer to this one as to the others.  **H** e who had so meticulously planned everything from A to Z ... From his arrival in Los Angeles to Chloe’s miraculous conception...

Such a beautiful miracle...

“W--What? What are you talking about?”

Did he think aloud again?

Bloody vulnerability ...

His eyes found Chloe's wavering shadow in front of him for the second time. She was beautiful, indeed. And not only because of her divine origins.

“ _Nononononono!_ Lucifer! Stay with me!  ** _Lucifer!_** _”_

So stubborn and domineering.

Oh, he did want to stay. He truly did.

But he belonged to darkness.

Since the beginning of times and the end of it.

He was, however, relieved to know the detective a bit closer to the truth as he surrendered for good to the frozen oblivion; briefly wondering why he had been so much scared that she might find it out one day.

 

 

 

**_Tbc_ **

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Dunno how many times I wrote these notes – my connection gives me hard time -_-)
> 
> Here is my revenge for those who have the chance to meet the cast of the show in Brighton X) Kidding, kidding! You know how much I love cliffhangers, right?
> 
> For the next time; “Acte de foi” or “From Darkness arose the Light” (it’s been a while for the last one).
> 
> I hope you enjoyed reading those few lines!
> 
> Bye bye!


	7. Like a miracle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ooops! 've got a lot of trouble for posting this new chap properly ^^' Sorry!

**LIKE A MIRACLE**

**~**

What about the _white_?

What about it?

Was that some kind of tacit, universal and timeless agreement among the medical institutions abounding on earth?

Who did once say  _"the white is the reflection of hope, of health" ? A_ n idiotic, deductive sentence that gave support to an equally nonsensical assumption.

Chloe had been staring at the white wall in front of her long enough to have wondered about this, and thus fairly often without ever getting a good or smart answer to it; anything that could have appeased her restless mind, just for a second.

She was surrounded by "white", wherever her eyes stopped.

Everything had turned into white; even before she arrived in this place looking like any other hospital. Turning into white when the rescue workers and their flashlights had finally reached them. White, like the sunlight that had blinded her when she had been driving outside. Turning into white when the doctor explained to her Lucifer's deep injuries.

_" It seems that Mr. Morningstar has been injured during your fall. His broken ribs haven't been immediately taking in charge and thus worsened his general state over the next few hours. An internal bleeding can be quite impressive to see and a serious complication, but I assure you he's in good hands..."_

Good hands.

White hands, tinted with the gloves they wore. White... But they wouldn't stay that way.

White walls.

This white bed.

These white curtains.

White, white, white and... white.

Others hues than white were unsuccessfully trying to balance the heavy atmosphere; a wall painted with shy green to show the entrance to the cafeteria a few meters away, rather uncomfortable gray seats welcoming people's relative patience inside the waiting room or even the garish red from a vending machine at the corner of the hallway.

None of them managed to capture Chloe's gaze.

There were some things that easily consumed the rest of the world.

Just like this white did. Sort of.

It was an absurd choice of hue. How could we think to connect health to a hue - a gaudy and so  _not_  comforting hue, moreover? Chloe didn't feel comforted by this uniformity.

She felt no comfort in front of this deplorable wall. She wasn't appeased by that same facial paleness that hadn't left Lucifer a single moment since he came back from the surgical unit. This said, his nightshirt as white as the rest significally reduced her partner's appearance. Just like the medical equipment that surrounded his unmoving body.

It was difficult to turn her thoughts towards any positive direction with that. Chloe had told herself over and over again that everything would be fine, that he was in good hands now, that nothing bad would happen to them both between these walls. Some meaningless thoughts inside this room, before Lucifer's closed eyes. Useless, really.

With a long sigh, the detective stretched the muscles of her shoulders, which painfully complained about this treatment, and closed her eyes. Her eyelids shut, she could have thought she was still stuck under these tons of concrete; still screaming Lucifer's name to bring him back to her, screaming for help to those who were making their way among the rubble.

One hour.

An hour to hear the stones fall, grazing metal. An hour without hearing Lucifer's voice again...

She mechanically moved her hand to her temple, rubbing the wound dressing hidden under her loose hair.

Touching the flood of useless thoughts without succeeding to clear them from her mind, just like this vise around her skull. She could almost hear Daniel admonished her over and over again, though he was no longer there.

" _There's nothing more you can do right now, Chloe. Go home and take some rest. Trixie needs you, too."_

Of course she wanted to go home, but sh-

She couldn't. Not now. Not yet.

She wanted to see her daughter, hold her in her arms and hold the certainty of never losing her again. She wanted to fall asleep beside her, huddled-up together under her pink blanket. Fall asleep and forget a bit.

But she couldn't.

She needed something else before.

Chloe opened her eyes. Lucifer didn't.

When will he open his damn eyes?

She leaned forward, her face close to his, and waited. What did she expect? She couldn't tell. A physical demonstration of life; a deeper breathing, a bending of his unmoving fingers on the sheet, a slight frown... Something that would finally ease her from all these deleterious thoughts.

Still, Lucifer didn't respond to her despair and remained to his peaceful oblivion. No bending, not the slightest frown or any noticeable change in his breathing. Nothing.

Squinting, the detective shifted and whispered in his ear;

"Nice try, but I won't leave this seat without answers to my questions."

She sat up properly and didn't take her eyes off Lucifer's features.

"I'll stay here as long as necessary, whether you like it or not."

She probably looked crazy by threatening someone unconscious and unable to defend himself, but she couldn't care less about it. She might have been worried about him - and she was - but she couldn't get away from that greedy frustration that stifled her more as the hours passed without any change. It almost looked perfectly calculated. The internal bleeding - unfortunate consequence of a deadly fall; that  _should_ have been deadly for anyone else – combined with his broken wing, passing out right on time; it was evident. The medical teams that had immediately separated them once they had been pulled out of the elevator shaft, this endless surgery... and now this.

It was really well played.

Giving her such information and then become totally inaccessible...

"Very well played." she mumbled, glaring at him. "You bastard..."

"It certainly sounds like him."

Chloe turned her head and took notice of Amenadiel's presence in the doorway. She hadn't even heard him come in, too busy she was to ponder and insult his brother lying in that awful white bed. Either that or Amenadiel was able to sneak in and out wherever he wanted without making a single noise - could be that, couldn't it? She didn't know much about his powers, other than his  _beefy squad_  status. Or she was just much more exhausted than she thought. One like the other, she was ridiculous anyway.

"Amenadiel! Good morning or... evening? What time is it?" she mumbled, looking for her phone in her jacket pocket.

"Five a.m. Visiting times are over; why are you still here?"

"The medical team gave up trying to get me out of here as soon as I showed them my badge." explained the detective, shrugging a bit. "What about you?"

"The benefits of being a family member, I guess."

Chloe nodded, looking at Lucifer's brother without a word.

Did he know that  _she_  knew?

Knowing Lucifer, the answer was negative.

Amenadiel took the free chair near the window. He sat beside the young woman without saying a word, looking for a moment at his brother's fragile silhouette. A silhouette so far away from this thousand-years-old strength told by the myths of every earthly cultures, far away from the Devil, this relentless maleficent demon without the slightest physical flaw. A flaw that should never have happened.

It was her fault.

_Hers._

And she still didn't know why.

" _As long as I'm staying near you, I become mortal."_

She didn't know what to think, actually. Not since-

"Dan told me what happened." said Amenadiel, interrupting her thoughts.

"Is that why you're here? You're planning to convince me to go home and sleep a bit?"

"Should I convince you?" he replied with a smile.

She shrugged, smiling in turn. She had no clear answer to give him. Getting answers was important for her, but going home for a moment to think about all this, lying down with Trixie beside her; it was important, too.

"Not if you want to waste your time."

"Got it. And to answer to your question; no, I'm here for my brother. If you don't mind having company, of course."

"I don't mind at all." Chloe reassured him, pulling on a corner of the blanket that was stretched over Lucifer to remove a fold in the fabric.

They didn't say a word for a moment, both feeling no need to speak, both looking at the Devil's unmoving body, both waiting for something new that wouldn't happen any time soon. Chloe's eyes lingered a long time on his face, his black curls teasing his forehead, his long eyelashes against his pale skin; such fine locks of a same kind of answer.

Lucifer had tried to describe her his real appearance - as he called it - although there was only one for the detective.

_"-...Well... It's quite the same that a burned face, I guess. In a more... infernal way."_

She tried to replace this human face with that very different one, searching her memory and her imagination, both obviously so far away from the reality he had portrayed in a few words. She had seen a few cases of serious burns when she started to work for the LAPD. That was after voluntary fires with multiple victims. skinless, red... She couldn't describe it.

And the smell.

Chloe mechanically tightened her fingers around the arm of her seat; feeling almost instantly sick.

"Is everything all right?" Amenadiel asked her.

She nodded, hardly swallowing with the knot that had just formed inside her throat.

"Yes. Yes, 'm fine."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm fine, really. It's just-I'm tired, 'no big deal."

It was Amenadiel's turn to nod, still looking concerned, though. A few seconds passed before she heard his careful deep voice again;

"I've heard that there was a staff room downstairs... If you want to close your eyes for a time-"

"- and move me away enough from Lucifer so that he could heal faster?" ended the detective.

She turned her head and wasn't surprised to meet his chocked expression.

So, it was "no" for her. Not a big surprise.

Chloe turned her head back to her unconscious partner, smiling slightly at this all new breach of his  _truth_ engagement.

"I already thought about it. Lucifer and I have been separated long enough since our rescue until we arrived at the hospital. And I don't even count the four hours of surgery on the other side of the hospital - which makes me think that he can't heal himself as fast as you both think, even though I would have been at the other end of the planet. Maybe it's because of his wing..." she thought aloud.

"His wing?"

"He broke it when he tried to save me; it's been in a bad shape since. That with the internal bleeding... So no, going away wouldn't help much. Except to avoid answering my questions. Stupid Devil."

She could feel Amenadiel's look piercing her skin. He stared at her a long time.

"How long?"

"Only a few weeks." replied the young woman. "But there're still so many things I don't know, apparently. And this asshole couldn't find a better plan not to telling me the truth!" she exclaimed, pointing at Lucifer.

She let out a bitter exclamation and then crossed her arms on her chest.

"I shouldn't be so surprised, right?" she mumbled.

Amenadiel didn't give her an answer, lost in thought. And Chloe didn't try to get some from him. It was up to Lucifer to give them to her. She wanted it to come from him.

When was he going to wake up?

She barely noticed that his brother had gotten up and invited her to do the same, staring blankly at the hand he was offering to her, confused.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm offering you some answers, for want of anything better than my brother's. And a cup of coffee." he added with a smirk. "Either one should provide you some comfort after that terrible day, don't you agree?"

Chloe hesitated; what if Lucifer did wake up in the meantime? A deep feeling of guilt seized her as soon as she seized his hand; a strong feeling that wasn't enough to deafen her need for answers instead of the actual Devil's quiet lethargy.

But she  _ **did want**_ answers.

And if there was one thing that Lucifer would understand... it was her choice to fulfill that desire at the cost of everything else.

 

 **-**   **xXx**   **-**

 

Now that she was sitting in front of that green wall, Chloe realized that she had quickly misjudged the lighter hues from the rest of the building. White wasn't that bad to look.

"Here."

She gladly accepted the cup of a darker hue offered by Amenadiel, a strong smell of cheap coffee brushing her nose. She already drank this so much at the precinct that she almost forgot the delicious taste of freshly milled coffee beans.

"Thanks."

She poured a lot of sugar in it and stirred the "coffee" with her spoon. Except for a few doctors and nurses who were waiting for the end of their shift by drinking another cup of coffee and no more think about the time; they were both alone. It was for the best; Chloe didn't know where this conversation would lead them. Where it would lead her feelings. In fact, this was the most uncertain thing at the moment.

Amenadiel took place before her, then he lifted his own cup to his lips. The sour prequel of a complicated talk. The detective didn't rush things, she had no interest in doing so and wasn't that impatient to start.

A real contradiction...

_"Give me answers, but jut those that I might like."_

Something like that, yeah.

She kept stirring the sugar in her coffee even if it had already disappeared into it, watching the movement of the warm liquid around her spoon.

"You seem to take the news surprisingly well." began Amenadiel after a while.

There you go.

There was the starting signal.

"It wasn't easy the first times." said Chloe with a tensed smile. "It's still complicated... most of the time."

"This is understandable. The proof of the divine is something difficult or impossible to deal with, for people as fragile as humans can be."

The detective let out a slight exclamation.

"By seeing Lucifer like this... I'd say that's an inter-species notion, isn't it?"

"Well-It's...What's happening to my brother can't be seen as a generality; it's-…"

" _Complicated_?" she helped him.

"Sort of." Amenadiel told her with a light laughter, seemingly uneased, though.

"Tell me about it..."

"How did you find out?"

Chloe shrugged.

"Lucifer left his cut wings in one of his cupboards. 'Couldn't any longer deny the facts right before my nose after that."

Amenadiel sighed deeply, getting instantly upset with the detective's explanation. He shook his head, staring into space, and began to mumble insults against his younger brother.

"...-lucked prick! He won't listen to me, will he?! How stupid I was to hope that he might think a bit after his last session with Linda! Wait-Wait, you talked about his wings earlier, didn't you?" he exclaimed, staring at Chloe, suddenly filled with hope about these divine limbs. "Didn't he cut them off after all? Why didn't he?"

"Because I asked him not to."

"You what?"

"I asked him to stop it. Only until he finds out the reason they came back." she explained.

Amenadiel stared at her, speechless, and then laughed.

"You're the very first person he listens, Chloe. You really must be somebody special to affect him and his behavior like this!"

Chloe smiled in turn, barely. Her hands clenched around the goblet as she took a long breath.

"I guess that... A  _walking miracle_  is indeed special." she said as calmly as she was able to.

As calm as she could seem, the detective felt antsy inside; each of her thoughts, each of her breathings acting together to bring it outside. Her trembling hand around her cup was the only thing that betrayed her real state of mind. Amenadiel didn't seem to notice though. If the young woman was possessed by untimely tremors; all of a sudden, he was frozen to place; a quiet, solid salt statue with its dark eyes on her without blinking for single a moment.

Of course, Chloe had expected to cause a more or less strong reaction by splaying her ace, but she had to admit that the angel's reaction here – well, the complete lack of it - wasn't planned at all. After all... That miracle "thing"; she had every right to feel upset about it, even if she didn't know much. But if Amenadiel reacted that way with just a few words...

What did she miss?

"Who told you this?" asked the angel with a tensed tone.

"Lucifer. I mean... I'm not even sure he realized what he was saying back then, in his bad condition."

"What else did he tell you?"

"Not much." answered Chloe, sitting up in her chair, feeling more and more uneased with Amenadiel's eyes on her. "It sounded like crazy stuff for the most of it. He said… "

Chloe tried to remember Lucifer's words as he told them before he lost consciousness.

"He said that your  **F** ather planned absolutely everything. That he had to protect me... protect me from himself."

She sighed, shaking her head.

"That's complete nonsense."

She began to nibble her thumb with anxiety and looked at Amenadiel who seemed to have nothing to say about this part of the story. Not even one additional question or two.

This anxiety she had been feeling for a moment instantly exploded. Chloe slowly moved her hand away from her mouth, staring at her partner's brother.

"Oh G-…" she whispered, stunned. "Tell me it's nonsense, Amenadiel. Please!"

"Chloe-"

" _Oh fuck-_ " she said in a very low tone, getting up and placing her hands on her strangely painful temples at once.

Two men that were sitting at a few tables from them stopped their conversation to stare at her, curious. Amenadiel leaned forward, moving his hand towards her, knowing then that he couldn't reach her from where he was.

"Chloe, please-"

She didn't listen, making a few steps till the other end of the table, going round in circles, not caring about the multiple curious looks on her. She had trouble breathing, thinking. She had so much hoped to have misunderstood Lucifer's words; she had convinced herself that it was nothing, just insignificant ramblings. All that coming from a seriously injured devil.

Exhaustion, her own exhaustion...Something, anything.

Anything, but certainly not the "truth".

"Oh for fuck's sa-!" she exclaimed in a breath, turning quickly to the table, not caring about Amenadiel's endless asking. "I'm a fucking walking miracle!"

A miracle.

Like-... Like the Virgin Mary!

Or Lazaru's resurrection.

A miracle.

"Why?" she murmured, staring blankly at the wall in front of her.

The detective finally turned to Amenadiel and looked him in the eye, the angel still struggling to appease her after this destabilizing revelation. A bomb would have been sweeter to handle... so much sweeter than this. Their trip in the elevator wasn't that terrible, after all.

A miracle. A straight creation from God, from Lucifer's holy  **F** ather... Why? Why even doing this?!

"Why?!" she repeated harshly, deeply upset.

"Chloe-"

"Lucifer told me that youand your  **F** ather were close; so, don't pretend you don't know." she warned him, her voice trembling with rage. "You do  _know_  something! You do!"

The subject was complicated enough for Amenadiel to wait for an alternative before he finally gave up the fight and sighed with resignation. At this point, Chloe wasn't expecting to be comforted or belied. As terrible as his answers might be, she needed to hear them.

He had to know something, he had to explain to her.

He had to; someone had to.

And right now.

"I don't know much about this." he warned her.

He waited for her to answer him, but the young woman remained silent and kept glaring at him, resolute. Amenadiel sighed again and looked down, probably unable to reveal what he knew while supporting Chloe's gaze.

"One day, my  **F** ather summoned me; an interview  **H** e kept secret from the rest of my family. It was thirty-five years ago. I wasn't surprised to be summoned; it has always worked like that with  **H** im and I guess it still does since. But... the secret around intrigued me. It was something new. Just like what  **H** easked me. Well... not that new, but this practice was forgotten for so long back then that I didn't think I'd use it right away."

"What did  **H** e ask you?"

"That I bless a couple so that they give birth to a child. I wasn't allowed to ask why... Never."

"This couple-... Was it-?"

Amenadiel nodded.

"Your parents, yes."

"You knew... The whole time... you knew!" murmured Chloe, annoyed at feeling tears tickle the corner of her eyes.

"I didn't know it was  **you** , Chloe." he tried to defend himself. "I only found out when I met your mother again six months ago. That's when I understood your emotional connection with Lucif-"

Amenadiel abruptly stopped talking, shutting his eyes and clenching his fists on the table.

But it was too late.

" _What?"_

Chloe's voice was a cold breath. Her whole body suddenly submerged by a freezing wave of understanding. Would she have wanted to move that she wouldn't have been able to, breathing was almost a miracle.

A miracle ... What a cruel irony.

The anxiety she had so much wanted to hide from his sight was now the mistress of her senses, of her emotions, of her very least thoughts. Chloe had no more control on them. It appeared to her then that she never has. Not even once.

She wasn't even supposed to exist.

If she was here, it was just-

It was-

"For him." she said aloud through her trembling lips.

She could feel Amenadiel's concerned look on her. She could also feel that freezing tumult ravaging everything inside her. One thought, more powerful than this indefinable chaos, remained in her mind.

"I need to get out of here."

And without warning, Chloe staggered towards the white, impersonal corridor; she clung on to that single thought, clinging on to that unnerved reason before this terrible truth. She barely noticed that Amenadiel had moved as well, holding her by the arm - she only stopped after she noticed this unpleasant tension in her numbed limb. She blinked several times, astonished to feel nothing more than that iron grip around her flesh.

"Chloe-"

"I need to get out of here." she repeated weakly by looking him straight in the eye.

He seemed to hesitate, but finally let her go.

When she finally reached the corridor, she heard Amenadiel's deep voice resounded behind her;

"I'll let you know when he'll wake up."

Chloe didn't answer, now almost rushing towards the exit of the hospital. Rushing to escape this truth, her own answer that she feared not being in Lucifer's favor. Nor in anyone's favor.

She could only run.

Run and avoid asking Amenadiel not to.

 

 

_**Tbc with... "The person I am."** _

**Author's Note:**

> Author’s notes:  
> \-------------  
> I’m late with my translation, so I hope being able to publish in two weeks. We’ll see. Thanks for reading me. Let a little comment ! X3  
> Bye bye !


End file.
